Rory McEwen: A New Perspective on Nature

The book Rory McEwen: A New Perspective on Nature was released in concert with a touring exhibition, both of which honor the extraordinary life of Rory McEwen, an artist whom Rachel “Bunny” Lambert Mellon deemed “the preeminent botanical artist of the twentieth century.”

The project features many examples of McEwen’s work presently belonging to various private and public collections around the world, including several paintings from Mrs. Mellon’s incomparable collection of botanical artwork. Rory McEwen: A New Perspective on Nature stands as a testament to the artist’s enduring legacy and astonishingly lifelike attention to detail.

Paul and Bunny Mellon: Visual Biographies

This beautifully illustrated book, both scholarly and accessible to all, provides a fascinating insight into the private world and intellectual passions of the renowned philanthropists Paul and Bunny Mellon through the two trompe l’oeil paintings that they commissioned for their main residence at Oak Spring, Virginia. The Mellons were avid collectors of art and rare books who also enjoyed and understood the genre of trompe l’oeil. Their two Visual Biographies reveal their personal tastes and interests as expressed through their collaborations with Martin Battersby and Fernand Reynard, two gifted European trompe l’oeil painters. Lucia Tongiorgi Tomasi superbly articulates these creative partnerships, while also placing the art in context within the history of trompe l’oeil. Biographical essays by Tony Willis illuminate the lives of Paul and Bunny Mellon and the background to the paintings that they commissioned. The book’s design exquisitely showcases the lives and interests of two sophisticated connoisseurs who nurtured one of the great private art collections of the late twentieth century.

Garden at Monceau

Originally published in 1779, Garden at Monceau is a richly illustrated presentation of the garden Louis Carrogis, known as Carmontelle, designed on the eve of the French Revolution for Louis-Philippe-Joseph d’Orléans, duc de Chartres. With its array of architectural follies intended to surprise and amaze the visitor, the garden was a setting for ancien régime social life. Carmontelle’s portrayal of his work in Garden at Monceau therefore serves as an expression of a key moment in the history of European landscape design, garden architecture, and social history. This facsimile edition, with its English-language text and reproductions of the original engravings, is accompanied by essays that interpret the landscape design and examine Carmontelle’s larger career as a painter and theater producer.

An Oak Spring Herbaria

Part of the Oak Spring Garden Library discursive catalog series, An Oak Spring Herbaria explores materials from the collection relating to herbs and herbals.

For An Oak Spring Herbaria, authors Lucia Tongiorgi Tomasi and Tony Willis selected sixty-three works from the Library’s extensive collections. The volume is thematically arranged into the following chapters: ‘Late Medieval Herbals’; ‘The Great Age of Renaissance Botany’; ‘Herbals and Plants from Distant Lands’; ‘Herbals by Herbalists, Pharmacists, and Physicians’; ‘Herbals of the Botanical Gardens and Private Gardens of Europe’; ‘Curious and Strange Herbals’; ‘Dried Specimens and Nature Printing’; and ‘American Herbals.’

An Oak Spring Pomona

Part of the Oak Spring Garden Library discursive catalog series, An Oak Spring Pomona explores a selection of the rare books on fruit in the Oak Spring Garden Library, described by Sandra Raphael, 1990.

An Oak Spring Flora

Part of the Oak Spring Garden Library discursive catalog series, An Oak Spring Flora explores flower illustration from the fifteenth century to the present time. It includes a selection of the rare books, manuscripts and works of art in the collection of the Oak Spring Garden Library, with descriptions by Lucia Tongiorgi Tomasi, 1997.

An Oak Spring Sylva

Part of the Oak Spring Garden Library discursive catalog series, An Oak Spring Sylva explores rare books on trees in the Oak Spring Collection, with descriptions by Sandra Raphael, 1989.