Amaryllis undulata

Ten ways of seeing

• measured cast yellow-green
• upright 1.61 : 1
• published 1802
• Plate 55

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

   论画以形似，见与儿童邻。

   —— 宋·苏轼《书鄢陵王主簿所画折枝》

   To judge painting by likeness alone is the view of a child.

   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 the darkest small patch: the whole tonal order is measured from there.

2. 02

   Name and Thing

   The binomial is Amaryllis undulata: the first word is the genus it belongs among, the second the epithet that sets it apart. Two words carry a whole provenance. The Chinese name 石蒜科 is a modern rendering of the Latin, not an old garden name.

3. 03

   Form and Colour

   Measured on this plate: flower colour covers 1.9% of the sheet, foliage 1.4%, the cast yellow-green with a second note of red. No other plate shares exactly this measure. Bulbous plants store the year underground — bulb, corm or tuber — then send up a few thick leaves and a single scape, with six tepals in cup, funnel or star.No colour group is recorded. 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 1.61 : 1) No details are appended: a plate for looking, not for keying out. The plant covers only 8% of the sheet, centred near the 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. Take a loupe to three places: petal edge, leaf vein, caption. An unbroken line means engraving; colour crossing the outline means a hand. 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

   兰陵美酒郁金香，玉碗盛来琥珀光。

   —— 唐·李白《客中行》

   Fine wine of Lanling, fragrant with turmeric; poured in a jade bowl, it glows like amber.

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

7. 07

   Symbolism

   The tulip was an imperial emblem in Istanbul and a speculative bubble in Amsterdam; the hyacinth sprang from a boy's blood in Greek myth. What bulbs share is concealment: next year kept underground. In a flora it is a species first and a symbol second; the order is worth keeping.

8. 08

   Season and Place

   Early spring to early summer, genus by genus: tulips and hyacinths first, gladiolus and amaryllis later. South African bulbs filled European glasshouses after 1800. The year 1802 on the plate is that of publication, not of flowering — the gathering came a year or two earlier. Read the locality and the flowering season both with a discount: one is hearsay, the other a ten-day peak.

9. 09

   The Book and the Hand

   “The Liliaceae - Volume Two” was drawn by Pierre-Joseph Redouté and published 1802-1816. This plate is Plate 55. The image is public domain; the hand-colouring is still one person's hand.

10. 10

    The Written Tradition

    宁古无时，宁朴无巧，宁俭无俗。

    —— 明·文震亨《长物志》

    Better old than fashionable, better plain than clever, better spare than vulgar.

    Li Bai's 'orchid wine, fragrant with yujin' is often misread as tulips; the Tang yujin was a turmeric-like root used to scent wine — same name, different plant. The difference is not of quality but of question: Europe asks what it is, China asks whom it resembles.