How is this better than photography? Surely it's easier to zoom in on a picture to see it's characteristics.
This is concerning: "her gaze is on plants, dried specimens of dead plants, up close, and closer, under a microscope. Sometimes she hydrates stems and flower parts, coaxing zombie life into them."
How does she know which parts of the plant to hydrate? What if it doesn't actually look like that in real life?
You would be hard pressed to find a single photograph that captures this much individual information about what the various parts and stages of a dandelion look like. Even to find the leaf shape captured correctly is hard for a photograph. I think in this case there's a difference between what is photorealistic and what is useful information for identification.
Very good answer. The botanical illustrator is taught how to demonstrate specific features of different taxonomies in a way that's natural and visually pleasing but conveys three dimensions of information, tactility, color, and biological characteristics (for example, do branches grow opposite one another or in a spiral up the stem, what is the texture under the leaf as well as above it, what does a bud look like, what does a live flower look like, what animals use this as a host plant and how, etc) that would be extremely difficult to photograph well.
It is often the case that the details that are important to human perception are different than physical properties alone. An illustration abstracts away superfluous details and exaggerates others in subtle ways. Think of them like a diagram.
This is concerning: "her gaze is on plants, dried specimens of dead plants, up close, and closer, under a microscope. Sometimes she hydrates stems and flower parts, coaxing zombie life into them."
How does she know which parts of the plant to hydrate? What if it doesn't actually look like that in real life?