Black Lilly (aka Devil’s Tongue or Snake Palm)
March 17, 2007 by Jana Bouc
Ink and watercolor in large Moleskine watercolor notebook sketched on site
(Click image to enlarge, select “All Sizes”)
These are some weird plants. We spotted them yesterday on a walk and I couldn’t stop and sketch so I took some photos (see end of post). They look like calla lillies except the part that’s normally white and yellow is nearly black and velvety with bright green stalks. Last night I worked on some thumbnail sketches, trying to make sense of the jumble of leaves and flowers so that I could make a painting of the plant.
Preliminary pencil thumbnail/value study from last night
But I realized I needed more information in order to understand them well enough to paint them. So today, instead of going to the Sketchcrawl in Berkeley, I drove back up to the North Berkeley hills. I found the house and it looked like nobody was home so I set up my little stool in the driveway and started drawing. I was painting when a woman approached me and said, “May I ask what you’re doing?”
“Painting a picture,” I said, holding up the picture to show her. “Is this your house?”
“No, I live next door and I’m trying to get my house out of foreclosure. I get nervous when I see someone studying my house.” (I was sitting facing her house.) She left me alone after telling me the homeowners were away for the weekend but that she shouldn’t be telling me that.
I love the way working outdoors incorporates all the senses. There’s a park nearby and I could hear kids playing soccer and neighbors discussing plumbing and babies, and the whole time I sat there I kept smelling something like fermenting grapes. With the rich purple of the plant, I imagined it was the scent of the flowers, but probably it was coming from a hidden compost bin.
Here’s a photo of the plant. The pink color is a figment of my camera’s imagination but I like it. The flowers actually range from black cherry to black like the one in the foreground with wonderful variations in spring green foliage. I can’t wait to get started on the painting!
WHAT A FLOWER!!!! LOOK S LIKE SOMETHING THAT ATE CLEVELAND!! LOL SUPER SUPER JOB, JANA! And congrats to you for risking the painting too!! I’ve been sketching out doors this week while the weather’s been warm — it is a delicious feeling to be among all the sensory experiences and the meditativeness of sketching!!
PS — JUST WANTED TO BE CLEAR — THE PHOTO OF THE FLOWER — THE FLOWER ITSELF, LOOKS LIKE IT WOULD EAT CLEVELAND — NOT YOUR PAINTING OF IT — WHICH I THINK IS AWESOME!! LOL JUST HAD TO BE SURE I DIDN’T MISSPEAK!! LOL
It looks like some kind of strange horned beast. And its texture in the photo looks sort of fleshy … What a creepy flower! Lovely sketch, though!
Hi,
I just found your blog and wanted to say hi and I love your work. I am a retired garden designer, and thought maybe you would like to know what this plant is? It’s common name is Devil’s tounge or Snake Palm, depending on where you are in the world. This is the smaller decorative variety…perennial. They do tend to stink when in bloom…smells a lot like something rotten or a compost pile…but they sure a neat looking.
Anyway…just thought you might like to know. I love your work on it. Good luck with the finished work.
Fascinating flower and wonderful painting of it.
Looks like a dragon that hatched into a flower instead. I wonder what it is!?
I love your sketch of it, in any case, and the story…
Terrific photos and painting of the horror I call “dead horse lily” as its smell of rotting meat attracts the flies which polinate it. (Yes, I had one in a garden, years ago.Fascinating, botanically, but thoroughly unpleasant in the garden!)
You have done it justice, Jana.
What a gorgeous black purple!
Just dropping by to say Hi and see what you’ve been up to. I love these lillies and your interpretation of them. I’ve never seen anything quite that colour before - they are gorgeous.
What a gorgeous flower and thanks to the comment above i now know what it is. I would have gone back also to paint it. your sketch is wonderful.
What a creepy wonderful flower… and your initial painting really cool. can’t wait to see the finished product. love the reworked camelia and your glass bowl just shines!
[...] I drew the stinky flowers I walked up the hill to the Berkeley Rose Garden. None of the rose are blooming but the surrounding [...]
[...] to finish and post it today, and did, even though the photo isn’t great. I worked from a watercolor I did on site, and a bunch of photos I took of this odd stinky plant on a walk a few weeks ago. I did some [...]
hello…
i came across this by chance. was looking for a way to identify some plants i’ve got, and i searched for “stinky plants”.
I don’t like to contradict people, but i am not sure the plants/flowers in your picture are the devil’s tongue.
From my searches after I saw your picture, devil’s tongue is a kind of amorphophallus (not sure I spelled that right), while what you have in the picture is exactly what I have in the pot by the window, some kind of lily/calla.
Oh well, your watercolor is wonderful and it really doesn’t matter the name of the plant… or does it?
I am just trying to find the name of MY plant.
All the best,
Calin
We’ve been looking and it might be the calla lily called Black Star…
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/20040055064.html
We have seeds, but these grew in a neighbor’s garden and he passed away…his neighbor gave us some seeds. Will report back if the information is different.
They did not have any smell that we were able to notice when we saw them in bloom.
Best wishes on your hunt!
When I was a kid (over forty years ago) , we had these growing in my parent’s garden (all dead and gone now, what a shame!) in a suburb called Hornsby, in Sydney Australia. The common name for these in those days was “Dead Dog Lilly.”
I know it is a late response, but I thought I would add this anyway. It is definitly not amorphophallus konjac (devils tonge) - they are much bigger and the stem is exceptionally tall (4ft and over). I have been doing my research trying to name this plance since I just bought one. All I had to go off was ‘black lily’. I believe the correct name for this plant is Arum palaestinum - black calla lily. Hope this helps to any hopefuls wanting to know the identity! And yes, the smell would have been eminating from the plant. It is one of the species which uses bugs and flies to polinate so it emits a smell of something rotting. If it was the amorphophallus konjac you where sitting so close to I don’t know if you would have handled it - one site details a diary of having the flower inside since it was too cold outside. It starts off being bearable and then within a couple hours they describe the stench as if someone had dug up a dead horse in their backyard. Wish me luck as I have just bought one of these also! LOL! (I hate my neighbours…
I forgot to add - nice painting by the way!