Alice – Artistic muse
“Flowers speak their own language. A universal language of beauty, loss, love, joy, fear and hope that transcends borders and cultures. My work is concerned with the exploration of flowers as metaphors for human activity and our place in ecology.”
~ Annie Kavanagh, botanical artist
Annie’s floral art explores the history and significance of flowers from a Victorian garden. The work invites discussion around ecology, biodiversity, the history and language of flowers and the role women have played in this narrative.
Alice is the artistic muse through which Annie tells these stories. She is loosely based on the first chatelaine of Roselyn – Alice Hancock (née Wilding) – but Alice is a figment of Annie’s imagination; part biographical and part historical.
Since 2021, Annie has developed an interactive installation based on a Victorian parlour showcasing her floral art. The immersive exhibition of floral photography explores the botanical history of her garden through the eyes of her Victorian heroine, Alice. Seen through Alice’s eyes, we learn about her garden, her flowers, their history, and their significance leading to two exhibitions: Alice – From Parlour to Garden (The Lieutenant’s Mess, Fremantle, 2022) and Alice – Conversations with Flowers (Gallery 152, York, 2023).
Each exhibition is made of two parts: Floral Portraits, a visual florilegium of her garden, and the Night Gardens, multi-layered photographs of native everlastings and endemic moths. Highly reminiscent of the style of the Dutch floral masters, Annie’s art – all created and edited on her iPhone – echoes their symbolism, depictions of flowers, Vanitas themes and chiaroscuro effect.
Throughout the exhibitions, Alice’s parlour played host to guest speakers, immersive events, and sensory experiences. From experts on garden history and perfumery, artist talks, and an alcohol-free botanic bar, to a unique dinner celebrating flowers and farm, many joined us in the parlour as we wove flowers into stories.
Guests were invited to engage with the space, which was transformed into a Victorian parlour, and for a while, immerse themselves in Alice’s world, contemplate what life was like for women like her in the 1880s, question why their gardens were cherished, and the importance of these flowers to them.
Alice invites us into her parlour. She wants her guests to immerse themselves in her world and engage in conversations about her garden (circa 1887). Why were these gardens so important to women like her? What impact did they have on native biodiversity? What was gained and lost by their cultivation? Through art, food, flowers and scent she bids you to consider these topics at your leisure.
The exhibition tells the story of Alice’s rose garden through the roses typically grown in the era. Using only flowers grown by the artist, Alice’s florilegium was recreated with a series of floral portraits and multi-layered images, focusing on the rose as its central motif, exploring its beauty, uses and symbolism through perfume, food and art.
Who was Alice Hancock?
‘Alice’ is a fictional character based on the first chatelaine of Roselyn, Alice Hancock. Unlike Mrs Hancock, Alice emigrated to Australia to begin her married life at Roselyn, but like Mrs Hancock, her garden and parlour would have been the focus of her life, as the only two places where women of the Victorian era had autonomy.
This body of work is part of ongoing research by the artist Annie Kavanagh about the history of her garden at Roselyn, a farm located in the Wheatbelt of Western Australia.
