George Olson

Artist's Statement

Before the summer of 1997 I had visited three Chicago prairies the Schulenberg Prairie at the Morton Arboretum, Ragdale in Lake Forest, and the Chicago Botanic Garden's Dixon Prairie. Several other sites, however, were familiar through newspaper and magazine articles which I had collected over several years. As I re-read these articles and corresponded with botanists and curators, I was anxious to visit sites such as Somme Woods in Northbrook, Indian Boundary Prairie in Markham, Goose Lake Prairie near Morris, the vast circular prairie at Fermilab, and (a bit farther afield), Curtis Prairie at the University of Wisconsin Arboretum.

When my wife and I arrived in Chicago in August 1997 for a one-year sabbatical, it finally became possible to meet some of the people with whom I had corresponded and to visit some of the above sites. Although the Chicago sabbatical has ended, I will never forget the excitement of tracking down these sites on my Chicago map, arranging guided tours, and collecting specimens for future drawings.

This exhibition is a celebration of individual plants as well as the prairies where they were found. Although panoramic views of each site are still a vivid memory, the drawings themselves represent a closer look at grasses and forbs which we tend to miss when driving or walking past. This zoom-lens approach has led to some startling discoveries about structure, color, pattern, and anatomical details. These qualities are especially obvious in a winter subject when the plant is reduced to a bare skeleton with its own muted colors.

On a technical level, my work has evolved gradually over the years. These drawings are the result of endless experiments with various media. My earlier small-scale black and white drawings have become large-scale pencil and watercolor images. There are numerous technical challenges: depicting a 10-foot sunflower on a 30-inch piece of paper, separating a plant subject from its visually crowded background, creating a definitive image of a plant when the live specimen is rapidly deteriorating, capturing on paper a plant which is too rare to be moved from its original habitat. Most of these problems are solved with patience and ingenuity.

Through my drawings I am hoping to make people aware of native American plants (some less familiar than others), to dispel some of the stereotypes about the midwestern landscape, and to promote the preservation and restoration of prairie remnants wherever they might be found.