Bloodroot

By Pierre-Joseph Redouté

Re-create the grandeur of French botanical artistry from the nineteenth century in your interior with this exquisite floral painting. Painted by the renowned Pierre-Joseph Redouté, whose paintings of flowers were called “Raphaels of flowers,” this wonderful image presents a beautiful picture of Bloodroot (Wachendorfia Thyrsiflora), also called the Marsh Butterfly Lily.

This botanical engraving, originally created between 1802 and 1816 for Redouté’s famous folio, Les Liliacées, was commissioned by Empress Josephine Bonaparte, who owned the famous gardens of Malmaison castle. Here Redouté described exotic species of plants growing in her garden.

This lithograph presents a magnificent thyrse of yellowish golden blossoms surrounded by darkly pleated sword-shaped leaves. The illustration is drawn in stipple engraving with hand-watercolored technique and displays remarkable details and transparency of nature.