The 3rd Annual, NYBG NYC-Area, Green Industries Intern Field Day Registration still open for the horticultural event of the summer 7/22/15

New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) and the School of Professional Horticulture (SoPH) invite all Green professional interns and an accompanying staff member to participate in the third annual Green Industries Intern Field Day tomorrow, Wednesday, July 22, at 10 a.m. for Hortie Hoopla III.

This Free event includes a full day of informative and inspiring sessions, including remarks from top horticulturists and garden designers, a career information session over lunch, tours of the beautiful gardens and Conservatory at NYBG, a plant ID contest, capped off with a BBQ in the early evening in the Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden.  

This event is for horticultural interns (18 and older), accompanied by one staff member from each organization.  Plans and a schedule can also be found at: http://www.nybg.org/edu/soph/hortiehoopla.php

Registration is required.  To register: Contact Eric Lieberman: elieberman@nybg.org or 718.817.8580.

Send the names and email addresses of each intern and staff person attending.  Don’t forget to include the organization you work with.  

Hortie Hoopla III - Wednesday, July 22, 2015

Check-ins begin at 9:30 am in the Ross Gallery with talks beginning at 10 am in the Ross Lecture Hall.

My Stories – Five inspiring bios by successful horticulturists who started as interns:

Karen Daubmann, Associate Vice President for Exhibitions and Public Engagement

Heather Liljengren, Supervising Seed Collector/Field Taxonomist, NYC Parks Greenbelt Native Plant Center

Rebecca McMackin, Director of Horticulture, Brooklyn Bridge Park

Jason Sheets, Brooklyn/Queens Regional Director, New York Restoration Project

Thomas Smarr, Director of Horticulture, Friends of the High Line

Thoughts on the Future of Horticulture – Ken Druse, award-winning garden writer, photographer, author of 20 books, and host of the weekly radio program Ken Druse/Real Dirt

Keynote Address: Keep Growing! An Abbreviated Anatomy of Cultivating Yourself and the Craft of Horticulture – Jared Barnes, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Horticulture, S.F. Austin State University, Nacogdoches, TX

12–1 p.m. — Career Information Session and Lunch

The Career Information Session and Lunch take place in the Support for Science Pfizer Science building’s lobby and terrace, respectively.

Following the lunch are the Garden Visits that will take place from 1 to 4 pm.  

The nearly 200 attendees expected at this year’s Green Industries Hortie Hoopla III will break into smaller garden visit groups, cleverly broken into cohorts based on the attendees astrological sign. (Did NYBG determine the astrological couplings are compatible or simpatico??)  It’s in the stars!

Aries or Leo, will start at the (1) Native Plant Garden entrance pavilion

Sagittarius & Taurus – start at the (2) Thain Family Forest entrance, just past the Native Plant Garden entrance

Virgo & Capricorn – start at the (3) Azalea Garden entrance

Gemini & Libra – (4) Perennial Garden entrance

Aquarius & Cancer – (5) Conservatory - Palm Dome

Scorpio & Pisces – (6) Conservatory - Casa Azul

This is a great way to meet new people, and who knows, it might lead to some exciting things.  A job or a romance is not out of the question - after all, astrology is a kind of science too - albeit a pseudo-science - but based on relationships… And then there’s that magic - not unlike horticulture or botany or taxonomy or gardens....

There are a total of five gardens to visit.  

At each garden, there will be one “Mystery Plant” to identify.  A 6th Mystery Plant will be in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory Exhibition House, where the pyramid-like glass structure is located.

Also at each garden on the tour there will be three School of Professional Horticulture students who will talk to the guests/attendees about the hort sites and the plants there.  

This year’s elite SoPH students hail from around the globe, represent the best of what horticulture’s future leaders will be, and are fully engaged in the rigors of SoPH’s exclusive study program.  The attendees are sure to be inspired by them.  

While it’s true that I’m again a SoPH instructor this semester and wear my heartful admiration for the students on my sleeve for all to see, anyone - not just those like me who work with them - can readily see their “hort nobility” in the making..  

 

Attendees can also see the blockbuster Frida Kahlo Art Garden Life exhibition. (check out the NYBG website at http://www.nybg.org/frida/. ) For those with smart phones, check out the app http://www.nybg.org/fridamobile/.  There will be time to visit this exhibit between 4 and 5:30 pm.  

Everyone agrees that there's probably no better way to bond than over food and drink. So after all the more formal, educational and informative program elements featured throughout Hortie Hoopla, there's the chance to network and meet new and interesting people who share a common interest: a successful career in horticulture.  

Charles Yurgalevitch & Alexandria Bogo (2014)

The BBQ at the Family Garden starts around 5:30 pm after the conclusion of the garden tours.  Here’s where the real fun and games get going - amid the luscious, vibrant gardens there, in the picnic area - fueled by homegrown food - some from the Bronx’s famed Italian food nirvana better known as Arthur Avenue and beer from The Bronx Brewery.

Launched in July 2013, The New York Botanical Garden Hosts 'Hortie Hoopla ... the Green event was established to better inform young people interested in a career in horticulture, ecology, landscape design, and ecological restoration about the myriad possibilities and opportunities. Geared toward people who want to improve our environment and the world by working with plants, the event gathered more than 80 attendees from the East Coast.

Doubling the size in just one year, the 2014 event attracted about 160 attendees, demonstrating that horticulture and green jobs offer an exciting, burgeoning career option and further - interested candidates were keen to learn about changing opportunities and the chance to network with other green professionals.  Garden Encore: The Second Annual NYC Green Industry …

Few - if any - institution other than NYBG and its SoPH program has the reach and reputation to produce a program of this caliber.  

Hortie Hoopla is the brainchild of Charles Yurgalevitch, Ph.D., Director of the School of Professional Horticulture and SoPH’s dedicated and tireless advocate of the students and the exciting field of horticulture. (see the August 2013 overview post of the first Green Industry Hortie Hoopla)

 

The Garden extends its special thanks go to this year’s sponsors for their generous support that allows them to provide the free lunch and BBQ.

·        Mario Bulfamante & Sons

·        Landcraft Environments, Ltd.

·        Metro Hort Group

·        Town & Gardens, Ltd.

·        NY State Arborists Association

·        NY State Turf & Landscape Association

·        Carl Schurz Park Volunteers

·        Trees New York

·        The Bronx Brewery

·        Bruce James & Pamela Moulton -- my Landscape Design Alumni Group and Metro Hort      associates.  Kudos to you!  What a good example.  Perhaps next year the LDSA can provide sponsorship..

Any anyone who is keen to support the diverse group of future green industry professionals can invest in this program.

See you at the Garden.  

Art in Nature Show Opens to Triumphant Reception: Discover Art Ecstasy in Garden State And on the Web! Shop Now.

Angels That You Need, Zeet Peabody

What better way to celebrate Earth Day 2015 than to visit the Art in Nature show at the AJ Dillion Gallery?
The month-long exhibition of art inspired by Nature is a glorious way to mark the significant
nexus of art and the natural world.  From the pretty beauty of botanical art and illustration to the powerful paintings of storm fury to the edibles of Ecuador by Bek Millhouse, the glamour of the Manolo Valdes at NYBG rendered by photographer James Murray  or the mysterious beauty of Kokedama garden art created by EunYoung, Silver Flower -- or fashion by Marissa Erickson Fashion or dreamy tree paintings by Jessica Wohlers -- and happy botanical art as soon by a Beatrix Potter Zeet Peabody, along with so many others including a Picasso-like Ed Fendley Profiles | Facebook, Leona Tenebruso-Shultes spectacular art, Michelle Lombard, and Mike Quon and his collages along with the powerful paintings of Dawn DiCicco . 
And I adore the performance art of Chanel Sampson Plant Killer  

I wanted the visitors and guests to be enchanted from the first moment they got to the Gallery. 

I sketched out my “Into the Woods” dream concept design.  

Then, working with Jessie Wohlers, artist and stylist (among her many talents) - we visited the floral district in Gotham to secure our materials.  All the elements soon came together: bold wisteria vines, twinkling lights, glass orbs to hang on the trees filled with lights, colorful butterflies, silk ombre shaded gauzy material that would serve as the grass, and lots and lots of pink rose petals to scatter on the “grass.”  We also got some plants and big sea shells - the Gallery is just a block in from the bay, after all -- yet another nod to Nature.

We got the vellum paper for Jessie to paint up the ethereal tree branches - to be suspended or floating fro the wisteria tree branches.  Those branches were molded in shape by Jessie’s body force!  Talk about girl power!  

Soon, after a bit of clean up

Jessie, prepping for the Art in Nature window displays

the artful pieces of the window display and the art on the walls was coming together.  

EunYoung & her popular Kokedama art

With her Kokedama Moss Art in tow from New York, EunYoung created her moss composition. Jessie was getting flirty with the charcoal and vellum to make the window art complete.

Fashion Art, Marissa Erickson

Photographic art3 - James Murray's photography & as seen in Manolo Valdes book of NYBG sculpture in the Garden 

Meanwhile, I was doing a bit of everything and still trying to get all the art in -- (it’s a little like herding cats…)  

Jessie Wohlers putting the finishing touches on her Art in Nature submission

I also wanted to get our elected officials in the loop - and did manage to secure congratulatory letters from Congressman Frank Pallone and Fair Haven Councilwoman Aimee Humphreys - which Frank read at the opening reception and have since proudly posted on the wall.  Thank you!

Emily and Frank were seemingly everywhere, getting bios up on the site, getting the art prices and names suitable for hanging. 

Frank: pre-show hanging art

Music set up time 

The day of the opening was beautiful.  But there was still much to do.  We weren’t nervous per se about attendance at the gala reception; at the same time, one couldn’t ignore it was Passover and the day before Easter.  The party plans proceeded unabated.

I worked up till 30 minutes before opening!  

My brother, the Grammy-Nominated musician, James Popik and one of his most popular chanteuse, Jen Starr, were already setting up for their jazzy-song filled music when I had to race home to get ready.

By the time I returned, the Gallery was glittering.  And not just from the Into the Woods display windows!  There were sooo many people milling about, enjoying the wine and cheese, each other on a lovely spring evening -- and most of all: the Art. The glorious, compelling, provocative art -- all of it inspired by nature.  

One of my favorite references with regard to art is that of the Stendhal Syndrome. This "condition" is said to characterize viewers who experience a dizzy and rapid heart beat when particularly beautiful or large amount of art is seen in a single place.  Coined in Florence, Italy by the French author Stendhal (why does all that sound so matter-of-course?!) When he visited the Basilica of Santa Croce, where Niccolò Machiavelli, Michelangelo, and Galileo Galilei are buried, he saw Giotto's frescoes for the first time and was overcome with emotion. He wrote:

I was in a sort of ecstasy, from the idea of being in Florence, close to the great men whose tombs I had seen. Absorbed in the contemplation of sublime beauty... I reached the point where one encounters celestial sensations... Everything spoke so vividly to my soul. Ah, if I could only forget. I had palpitations of the heart, what in Berlin they call 'nerves.' Life was drained from me. I walked with the fear of falling.

See how art -- especially art of immense beauty in the natural world - can affect us?

Nature touches each of us in her own way -- and the artist’s eye sees things and interprets the natural world in such beguiling and powerful vision.  

The artists were there, keen for the opportunity to share their spirit with the eager and interested guests.  After all, artists usually work solo most of the time -- so all this party exuberance is most welcome.

Artist, Zeet Peabody, Fan, & his charming art

Artist, Kira Yustak

Photography artist, Rachel Watkinson

As owner of AJ Dillon Gallery, Frank welcomed the guests and read the electeds letter of congratulations.  I sincerely thanked Frank, Emily, my Mother, husband Bill, my extended family in attendance -- and especially the artists.  

Captured on video by my dear friend, Wendy, here are my opening-reception remarks.

The evening was a success. The AJ Dillon Gallery is THE place to be. 

Artist Barbra (Love the Flower!) & AH Councilman, Peter Doyle

Aimee & Michael Humphreys

James & Jen, artful musicians perform at Art in Nature reception 

When finally, I had to break away after the event -- even though there were plenty of folks still browsing the gallery -- as my guests had headed up to the Wine Bar next door.  But not before tiptoeing out into the display cases to adjust a twinkling light!

Me, Jim/musician & brother, Mother

A big thank you to everyone who helped make the event one for the record books.  To the Dillon Gallery family, artist Michelle Lombard who - like a trooper -- volunteered to take the the Art in Nature postcards to Sickles Market so their bazillions of customers could learn about the exhibit.  No stranger to all things natural, organic, artful, and community-oriented, Sickles is a go-to place for local food and garden plants.  Tori Sickles was kind enough to allow us to bring over the cards.  Jenny from First Avenue Florist allowed me to run in and whisk away a potted plant in time for the opening party.  What can I say?  It takes a village.

Budding Botanists

And speaking of community support, our new best friend is Laurie Brekke.  How my garden path never crossed this GoSprouts dynamo I’ll never know. (Plus now, all the “You’ve been flocked” Pink Flamingo mystery is revealed!)  

Laurie helped me reach the area’s parents to tell them about the Saturday “Budding Botanist” potting up program at the Gallery.  At the Free, hands-on, fun session, I show the children how to pot up some radish seeds -- just in time for a swell Mother’s Day gift.  We give them the soil, seeds, and Garden Pendant pots, I designed and created.  The kids love it.  

Frank has a table and little kid-sized chairs all set for them. 

And I brought some kid-sized tools, too.

Thanks Laurie.  And it’s fun Tweeting from my @GardenGlamour with Laurie, er, @PussBoots

The Gallery

One of the best services the AJ Dillon Gallery can now offer its artists is the ability to reach a vast, unlimited audience.  It wasn’t easy to get the technology to cooperate - but it is “not the boss of us” - so together, Emily and I had our way with the “Shop Now” feature on the AJ Dillon Facebook page and on the site under the AJ Dillon Web Store tab  While not every piece is in the store yet -- we’re getting there…

I so strongly support artists and their vision and craft.  Every artist and every piece of work has a story… I think those stories amplify their work.  Who doesn’t love to walk around a gallery or museum or your home and not only describe the beauty of the art there, but also how it was the artist toiled at making the piece.  The art can look infinitely different, always.  It’s what make the art enduring -- endlessly fascinating, and compelling.  An artist cannot help expressing themselves.  They’ll go without food (the starving artist label comes from truth), defy all odds to create - to work and fuel the fire within…

The fact that we can work with them to identify a greater audience who can discover their work is the best reward.  

Please visit the AJ Dillon Web Store. Share with your friends and family.  Support the arts.  And buy art.  You deserve it.