Water Forget-Me-Not (Myosotis scorpioides, Plate 50) by Pierre Joseph Redouté, 1827

Pierre-Joseph Redouté’s Choix des plus belles fleurs, plate 50, presents the water forget-me-not (Myosotis scorpioides) as a rising, loosely branching study of blue flowers and fresh green foliage. Created for the 1827 publication Choix des plus belles fleurs, the composition is notably open: rather than filling the page, its stems unfold across a generous off-white ground, allowing each cluster, leaf and unopened bud to retain a distinct silhouette. Tiny yellow centres punctuate the blue corollas, giving the delicate flowers an unexpected visual intensity.

Redouté was among the most celebrated botanical illustrators of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. His flower studies belong to a culture in which close natural observation, botanical classification and decorative refinement were closely intertwined. This plate exemplifies that balance. The plant is sufficiently precise to communicate its structure and stages of growth, yet it has also been arranged with the poise of a floral portrait. Scientific information never overwhelms the graceful movement of the specimen.

A closer look

The eye first settles on the central clusters of fully opened flowers, where subtly graduated blues deepen towards the folds and edges of the petals. Their warm yellow centres form a scattering of minute points among the cooler colour. Redouté varies the angle of the blossoms: some face outward as neat, rounded stars, while others turn aside or recede behind neighbouring flowers. These small shifts prevent the cluster from becoming diagrammatic and create a convincing impression of natural growth.

Below and to the left, broad green leaves give the slight flowers a more substantial base. Their smooth surfaces are modelled through gentle tonal changes, while clearly articulated veins describe the internal structure without making the foliage appear rigid. Overlapping leaves and stems establish a quiet sense of depth. Darker greens occur where forms cross or curl away from the light, while paler passages along the leaf surfaces suggest their supple texture.

The composition becomes airier towards the upper right. A slender, curling stem carries progressively smaller blossoms and tightly closed buds, leading the gaze upwards in an irregular rhythm. This transition from mature flower to bud is both botanically informative and visually elegant. At the foot of the plate, refined script identifies the plant as “Le ne m’oubliez pas ou Vergissmeinicht”, while the Latin name Myosotis scorpioides and Redouté’s name appear to the right. The multilingual labelling places the familiar forget-me-not beside the formal language of botanical classification.

Context and significance

Choix des plus belles fleurs emerged from a period of sustained European fascination with botany, horticulture and the systematic description of plants. Botanical illustration served several audiences at once: it recorded identifying features, circulated knowledge and offered readers images valued for their aesthetic delicacy. Redouté became especially associated with this meeting of accuracy and elegance. His restrained backgrounds isolate each specimen, while his careful arrangement of stems and blooms gives plants the compositional presence more often accorded to portrait subjects.

Plate 50 is particularly compelling because its subject is modest rather than spectacular. The water forget-me-not depends not on grandeur but on accumulation: many minute blossoms, nuanced leaf veins and buds at differing stages of development. Redouté’s treatment makes that small scale rewarding to examine, preserving the plant’s botanical identity while revealing the intricate order within an apparently casual spray of flowers.

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