A Rose a Day No.47
Still-life paintings of roses are a staple of Western art, although they are very rare in East Asian art, at least before the forces of Westernization influenced taste, and made the rose a familiar icon of beauty. But the flatness and all-overness of the composition of this painting stakes a somewhat ‘Oriental’ note.
Two important wild roses that are native to Korea are Rosa multiflora and Rosa rugosa.
Nowadays in Korea, domesticated roses are still less prominent in gardens and parks than in the West, but cut-roses are a very common gift. Korea now has its own home-made hybrid roses, and by coincidence, the centre of the rose-farming business is near where I live in Paju county. There is also a lively Korea Rose Society.
This is an oil painting by a Korean, Lee Kyung Soon. It was made in 2004 and is called ‘Roses in the Garden’. It’s nice to think that her roses, although almost certainly hybrids bred in the West to suit Western taste, actually have Chinese parents, and that is why the flowers have the form they do, repeat blossom, and some are yellow.
Painting courtesy of Lee Kyung Soon and Cho Kheejoo.
A Rose a Day No.23
To my surprise, this year the rose named ‘Simplicity’, which we planted five years ago and that grows next to the steps up to our front door, has decided to blossom again at this late point of the year. No doubt it is celebrating the publication of my book (or the warm daytime weather - it is already dropping below zero at night).
‘Simplicity’ is classified as a ‘Shrub Rose’, and was bred by the American rosarian Warriner in 1978. Its parent is the seedling of ‘Schneewittchen’, a white Polyantha rose bred by the famous German breeder Peter Lambert in 1901. Polyantha roses are characterized by sprays of delicate flowers held above the foliage, and this class is the result of crossing climbing varieties of Rosa multiflora - which is a native of these parts but blossoms only once but from whence it gets it multifloriferousness - and Rosa chinensis, which is the parent from where Polyanthas and ‘Simplicity’ derive their capacity to repeat-flower. This parentage also explains why ‘Simplicity’ is quite happy growing in Korea. It is, in effect, a local.
As the Encyclopedia of Roses writes, ‘Simplicity’ ‘has been introduced all over the world (except Europe) as a healthy, fast-growing, easy-to-grow landscaping rose. Like its parent, ‘Simplicity’ may suffer a little from blackspot [mine does a little, as you can see), but it is extremely free-flowering [mine definitely is!]. In hot climates it flowers all year round [Korea is not a ‘hot climate’].’
Here is the same rose in full bloom in the early summer.
