Looking Back For Our Future

Royal Birmingham Society of Artists Gallery , Birmingham 13– 24th May 2025. 18th May Celebrations for the World wide Day of Botanical Art.

Sally Pinhey's painting of Hen gymro wheat will be one of the paintings on show at the Botanical Artists World Wide exhibition at the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists Gallery, Birmingham, May 13- 25.  

Her life-size painting shows the genetic variety in a single crop together with the full length of the straw. Hen Gymro wheat “Old Welshman” wheat is a landrace variety sown traditionally in Welsh uplands where it delivers crops better than modern varieties under adverse ripening conditions.

The straw is very long and tough, up to 128 cm., and ideal for thatching. Seed collected from small mixed farms have great genetic diversity providing resistance to pathogens and weather vagaries.Originally grown for bread for local use, the soft dark flour is now in demand for craft baking as it makes a malty nutty loaf promoted by the Slow Food movement. 

Seed is available from Wild farmed for regenerative agriculture. Special events will also be held to celebrate the Worldwide Day of Botanical Art on May 18, 2025.   Sally's other painting of buckwheat and hoverfly will be showing on a rolling on line exhibition.   She is delighted to contribute to the vital purpose of botanical art in supporting scientific information.