Multi-secular and regional trends of aquatic biodiversity in European Early Modern paintings: toward an ecological and historical significance

The King's aquatic desires: 16th‐century fish and crayfish introductions into Spain

“…The way forward involves increasing interdisciplinary collaborations, through which researchers from the natural sciences and humanities can benefit from the knowledges and interests of each other (Szabo, 2010). This work has highlighted the informative potential of archived documents, but other useful historical sources include geographical descriptions, trade accounts, fisheries statistics, newspapers or paintings and photographs (Clavero et al, 2017; Gamarra & Solé, 2000; MacKenzie et al, 2022; Pipek et al, 2015; Tribot et al, 2021). Several areas around the world have important documentary heritages containing information on biodiversity (Clavero & Revilla, 2014), as exemplified by the databases generated in China (Turvey et al, 2015) and Spain (Viana et al, 2022).…”

The role of pre-19th century art in conservation biology: An untapped potential for connecting with nature

“…The former identify the specimens represented; the latter differentiate symbolic and allegorical iconography from reliable representations that were intended to be realistic (De . Other research has shown the interest of historical art in understanding the environmental history of marine mammals (see for example Brito et al, 2019;Mazzoldi et al, 2019) and aquatic biodiversity (Guidetti and Micheli, 2011;Tribot et al, 2021). Finally, researchers have reflected on how painting could inform the European history of climate (Metzger and Tabeaud, 2015) and air pollution (Zerefos et al, 2014).…”

“…This increases understanding not only of the linearity of causes and consequences of human impact on nature, but also the changes of human perceptions of nature, and even prompts questions about the variation of human-nature relationships. A simple way to collect the quantitative data necessary for the in-depth examination of reciprocal relations between pre-19 th c. art and NC would be to constitute a database of artworks specifically representing aquatic biodiversity (through participative science programs, such as www.biodivaquart.fr, Tribot et al, 2021). A set of analyses of the perceived effect of aquatic NC and PEB on aesthetic responses could then be applied to this corpus, using environmental psychology tools adapted to the specific case of aquatic biodiversity.…”