Story behind the art of Catherine Watters

28th Annual International

American Society of Botanical Artists and Marin Art & Garden Center

Chilean Bellflower

Lapageria rosea

I have been interested in Lapageria rosea, Chilean bellflower, for many years and was delighted to discover that it grew in the South American Collection at the UC Berkeley Botanical Garden, near my home. The garden has one of the largest collections of the Lapageria genus in North America, with more than twenty named and unnamed cultivars in its collection.

Lapagerias first came to the Botanical Garden through the collecting efforts of T. Harper Goodspeed. He was a professor of botany at the University of California, Berkeley, and served the Garden in many capacities, including as director from 1919 to 1957. Goodspeed made six collecting expeditions to the Andes of South America. An accession of wild Lapageria rosea collected near Trumao, Chile, and dating to Goodspeed’s 1935-1936 expedition still grows in the South American section of the Garden. This is the one I illustrated.

The Chilean bellflower or copihue, its indigenous name, is endemic to Chile and proudly serves as the country’s national flower. It is an evergreen vine that grows in forests in the southern part of Chile. It can grow more than thirty feet high in the trees of the South American section of the Garden. The plant has become rare due to over-collecting and deforestation and in 1977 it was given legal protection in Chile.

In 1802, Spanish botanists Ruiz and Pavón, who led expeditions to Peru and Chile, named the Chilean bellflower, Lapageria, in honor of Empress Josephine, using her maiden name: Marie-Josèphe-Rose Tascher de La Pagerie. They wanted to recognize her dedication to botany and her role in promoting the cultivation of exotic plants in her beloved garden at Château de Malmaison, located west of Paris. Ruiz and Pavón had previously named Bonapartea juncea, a Peruvian plant, after Napoleon Bonaparte, Josephine’s husband. The species rosea describes the pinkish-red color.

In my painting, I wanted to create the feel of intertwining vines with deep rosy-red flowers cascading downward. My biggest challenge was getting plant material as it grows so high in the trees located in a steep section of the botanical garden. Thankfully a Garden staff person did the collecting! 

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Read more about this artist's work: BAWW 2025