Botanical Art from the Golden Age of Scientific Discovery

by Anna Laurent

Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, wall charts were a familiar classroom component, displaying scientific images at a large scale, in full color. But it's only now that they've been superseded as a teaching tool that we have begun to realize something their ubiquity hid: they are stunning examples of botanical art at its finest.

This beautifully illustrated oversized book gives the humble wall chart its due, reproducing more than two hundred of them in dazzling full color. Each wall chart is accompanied by captions that offer accessible information about the species featured, the scientists and botanical illustrators who created it, and any particularly interesting or innovative features the chart displays. And gardeners will be pleased to discover useful information about plant anatomy and morphology and species differences. We see lilies and tulips, gourds, aquatic plants, legumes, poisonous plants, and carnivorous plants, all presented in exquisite, larger-than-life detail.

A unique fusion of art, science, and education, the wall charts gathered here offer a glimpse into a wonderful scientific heritage and are sure to thrill naturalists, gardeners, and artists alike.

 
 

Genres: Art, Nature, Plants, History

224 pages, Hardcover

Published October 24, 2016

Reviews

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Exactly what we are hungry for: painstaking attention to plant forms rendered in stunning stillness and often saturated loveliness. I am only sorry this book contained no peonies. (WHY) I adore the humans who tried to graphically represent all "economic" plant matter. This is an argument for no cameras, if only to make people paint so carefully.

[Alexandra Yakovleva · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pretty illustrations!

[Vivian Wiltshire · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is beautifully illustrated and has over 200 botanical
wall charts and really interesting facts to go along with them....
I found it an interesting read!