Hibiscus Rosa sinensis

Ten ways of seeing

• measured cast red
• upright 1.55 : 1
• published 1818
• Plate 65

Not a catalogue entry but a way of looking: how to stand, what to notice, how the line was cut — then, halfway, a line of Chinese poetry: how the ancients saw this same flower. After it, the flower's language, its season and homeland, its book; and at the end one line of classical prose — and a pair of eyes to take away.

1. 01

   First Look

   真山水之川谷，远望之以取其势，近看之以取其质。

   —— 宋·郭熙《林泉高致·山水训》

   Mountains and valleys: from afar take their momentum, up close take their texture — the two distances from which any picture is read.

   The sheet is vertical: the eye climbs and settles in the upper half. Let the plant stand before you look for detail. Then step in close: watch where colour meets line, and whether the line ever breaks. Third, find where the red is deepest: the whole tonal order is measured from that patch.

2. 02

   Name and Thing

   Only the genus Hibiscus is given; species-level names came later. The Chinese name 朱槿 is a modern rendering of the Latin, not an old garden name.

3. 03

   Form and Colour

   Measured on this plate: flower colour covers 11.7% of the sheet, foliage 9.2%, the cast red with a second note of amber. No other plate shares exactly this measure. Flowering trees and shrubs put out branches first; blossoms open before or with the leaves, usually five thin, translucent petals around a cluster of fine stamens. Filed under red — a red close to carmine, built in washes from a pale ground. Three things fix the habit: leaf arrangement, tepal count, and how the flower is borne.

4. 04

   Composition

   Tall and narrow, the plant rising in one movement with generous margins — the upright format of most floras. (about 1.55 : 1) No details are appended: a plate for looking, not for keying out. The plant covers only 22% of the sheet, centred a little right of centre; the emptiness is where the eye rests. Cover the margins with your thumb and the plate suffocates; uncover them and the flower breathes again.

5. 05

   Line and Colour

   The first half of the nineteenth century moved from copper to steel to lithography; stipple could render the softest transition. There is evidence on the back too: the plate mark pressed into the paper, the slight relief of the pigment, lines worn shallow in a later printing. If you mean to copy it: take its skeleton, its margins and the order of its colours; the burin's hatching is the language of copper — suggest it with pencil density, do not imitate it stroke for stroke.

6. 06

   Poetic Resonance

   疏影横斜水清浅，暗香浮动月黄昏。

   —— 宋·林逋《山园小梅》

   Sparse shadows slant across the shallow water; hidden fragrance drifts in the dusk of the moon.

   The poem gives the mood first and the picture supplies the form; set the line beside the plate and the red the corolla becomes its resting point.

7. 07

   Symbolism

   Plum is solitude, peach is marriage, apricot is spring itself, crabapple is a fragile fate; the hibiscus, opening at dawn and falling at dusk, is impermanence. This plate leans red, which in flower language adds one more degree of feeling. In a flora it is a species first and a symbol second; the order is worth keeping.

8. 08

   Season and Place

   Mid spring: plum first, then peach and apricot, cherry last — the season keeps its order. cherry and crabapple went east to Japan and west to Europe. The year 1818 on the plate is that of publication, not of flowering — the gathering came a year or two earlier. The bud and the ripe fruit on one branch tell the season; the name in the title often tells the journey.

9. 09

   The Book and the Hand

   “Flora Italiana” was drawn by Gaetano Savi and published 1818-1824. This plate is Plate 65. The image is public domain; the hand-colouring is still one person's hand.

10. 10

    The Written Tradition

    桃之夭夭，灼灼其华。之子于归，宜其室家。

    —— 《诗经·周南·桃夭》

    The peach tree young and lovely, its blossoms blazing; this girl goes to her new home, and it will be well with her house.

    Lin Bu of Hangzhou famously took the plum as his wife and the crane as his son; the Book of Songs already used peach blossom to open a wedding song. You need not parse every word: take the line, and the flower acquires a second face.