Create your own botanical bookmark inspired by artist Terry Adkins’s passion for reading and works on view in Terry Adkins: Resounding. Adkins often explored historical figures in his practice, and he was fascinated by the surprising connections between two twentieth-century innovators: American agricultural scientist George Washington Carver and French conceptual artist Yves Klein. He created several works referencing these connections including their different relationships to the sea, their shared interest in botany, and the fact that they developed a similar hue of ultramarine blue several decades apart. For a series of works on paper titled After Bonnaterre (2013), Adkins started with eighteenth-century botanical illustrations and applied multiple layers of a vibrant ultramarine gouache to evoke the blue developed by the two men.
In the steps below, learn how to easily transform plant clippings into giftable bookmarks with a little patience and a touch of blue paint.
