Maryann Roper

I am retired from an academic career in Medicine (Pediatric Oncology), having had appointments at several universities and at the National Institutes of Health / National Cancer Institute.

Plants have always been part of my life. Some years ago, I began to take botanical art classes and have been working on growing that interest.

Title of the Project:

Nut-bearing trees native to the Southeast United States

About the Project:

When I see trees, I see leaves, bark, color, shape, size. Choosing to paint trees for my final year project was meant to push myself to look beyond the leaves: to see what I don’t often have the opportunity to see. This quickly became as much of a botany project as an art project.

Finding the staminate and pistillate flowers of each species was more of a challenge than I had imagined. Dissecting developing nuts led to [for me] the surprise discovery of a liquid phase in nut development.

Showing fall leaves and different aspects of the final maturation of nuts is the focus of this set of paintings.

Illustrations: