Children, Youth and Environments Vol 13, No.1 (Spring 2003) ISSN 1546-2250 AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY Anne Ophelia Dowden Botanical Artist and Author 1 Citation: Dowden, Anne Ophelia. “Anne Ophelia Dowden, 1907- .” Children, Youth and Environments 13(1), Spring 2003. pp. 23-47. Introduction This autobiographical essay chronicles Anne Ophelia Dowden’s youth, spent observing nature in wild and manicured places, and her career as an illustrator and author of more than 15 botanical books, many of them created for young people. From a childhood filled with “exclamations of wonder” through an adult life rich with experience, she has for the past 96 years sustained an ongoing pursuit of her deep interests in the natural environment, an intense devotion to environmental education and an unmatched patience in her work. As a young woman, Dowden left her childhood home in Boulder, Colorado, to attend Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) where she graduated with a degree in art in 1930. Seeking to publish her work, Dowden then moved to New York City. After managing the art department at Manhattanville College for more than 20 years, she embarked on a flourishing freelance career, and became renowned for the technical accuracy and artistic beauty of her work. Her paintings are frequently exhibited alongside those of the younger artists she inspired. The Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation at Dowden’s alma mater recently published the first retrospective catalog of her paintings, Anne Ophelia Todd Dowden: A Blossom on the Bough. Now settled at the foot of the mountains in which she first collected blossoms and spied on insects, the artist reflects on a life well lived. Affectionately called the “grandmother” of contemporary botanical artists in the U.S., Dowden is best known for her 382 intricate watercolors of flowers. With a keen eye for the color of life and a scientist’s fascination with the workings of nature, she brings our attention down to earth. Even in the least hospitable urban environments, she finds the green among the gray. Weeds that grow in patches of city soil become fascinating studies of survival in Dowden’s steady hand. A long-time resident of Manhattan, the artist was motivated to search out the native botanical denizens of city streets in the early 1970s. She compiled a primer for young urban dwellers, Wild Green Things in the City: A Book of Weeds. The book, now out of print, speaks eloquently of the challenges and opportunities of growing up in cities, for both plants and children: “Our city wild flowers grow in earth that is packed hard, with few spaces for the vital water film to collect around soil particles. … It is important to find out what traits give some plants the ability to do so well in spite of so many difficulties.” Dowden has devoted much of her work to communicating the wonders of nature to young people, writing and illustrating volumes that inspire scientific engagement and close examination of nature. She reminds us that to truly see, we must learn. CYE republishes this essay, accompanied by an exhibit of select work, in the interest of children, with the hope that reading it will inspire adults everywhere to help young people cultivate their innate curiosity in their natural surroundings. - Darcy Varney University of Colorado 383 Anne Ophelia Dowden 1907 The great botanist Linnaeus, who devised our system for classifying and naming all the plants on earth, also classified botanists. One kind on his list is the species "much given to exclamations of wonder." I guess I am an example of that species. At least I am intensely aware of the world of plants and animals that so completely encloses us human beings. And I am always surprised that there are people not aware of itpeople who do not realize that if it were not there they would not be there either, and that the environment is more than a nice place for a vacation. Getting acquainted with this natural world is tremendously important, and caring about it is the moral duty of every person who shares its benefits. But few moral duties are so much fun in their performance. Just looking at flowers and birds and...