Painting as Exploration: Visualizing Nature in Eighteenth-Century Colonial Science*

Bleichmar, Daniela

doi:10.1080/10609160600607499

Cited by 43 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…15 But by the end of the eighteenth century the situation had changed dramatically. During that century, the Spanish Crown sponsored major scientific expeditions, as described by Daniela Bleichmar (2006), to Peru, Mexico, and the Philippines. In 1804Á/06 it sponsored a smallpox vaccination campaign throughout its American and Philippine realms.…”

Section: Fostering the Scientific Enterprise In Seventeenth-and Eightmentioning

confidence: 98%

Research, Development, and Empire: State Support of Science in the Later Spanish Empire*

Vos

2006

Colonial Latin American Review

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Section: Fostering the Scientific Enterprise In Seventeenth-and Eightmentioning

confidence: 98%

Research, Development, and Empire: State Support of Science in the Later Spanish Empire*

Vos

2006

Colonial Latin American Review

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“…''As the herbalists Roque and Esteban arrived with many uncommon plants, I put the best specimens in water for the subsequent formation of the plates, and doing what was usual on such occasions: for instance, outlining the entire plant, doing the fruiting anatomy and painting two leaves one to the right and one on the back. Although, for some, to save time this last part was left out conserving them in water'' (Nieto Olarte, 2000: 87) Daniela Bleichmar rightly pointed out that for Mutis the images were an integral part of the project to explore the American nature and formed a part of European science's globalization project, which was to create and circulate abstractions about nature that were visually-favoured (Bleichmar, 2006). As she notes ''the images they kept were unstable and were transported far.…”

Section: A Botanical Drawing School In the Heart Of New Granadamentioning

confidence: 99%

Illustrators of the New World. The Image in the Spanish Scientific Expeditions of the Enlightenment

Mulero¹

2012

Cult. Hist. Digit. J.

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In the Eighteenth Century, with the boom in the exploration of the Earth, most travellers and explorers had painters and illustrators at their sides who recorded their adventures, even their deaths, the exotic locations they visited, the aborigines, the landscapes or the strange creatures or plants that inhabited them. The presence of artists would increase in these types of exploration companies, sent by Spain, in order to recognise the natural resources and the imperial control of their territories. We take as a starting point Löfling’s expedition, in which naturalist artists seek to comply with the requirements of the Linnaean classification system then, looking at the case of Francisco Requena, who cartographically represented the territory and drew the activities of his own expedition members along the boundaries with the Portuguese empire. Likewise, we analyze expeditions known as “Botanical” to the different viceroyalties, which attempted to transmit the American nature idealized in a few “types” that were drawn and recorded to make the new species and the wealth of the Empire known, until finally arriving at the expedition of Malaspina, in which there is a step towards the depiction of the imperial landscape.<br><br>En el siglo XVIII, con la explosión de la exploración de la Tierra, la mayoría de los viajeros y expedicionarios llevan a su lado a pintores y dibujantes que dejan constancia de sus aventuras, incluso de su muerte, de los lugares exóticos visitados, los aborígenes, el paisaje o las extrañas criaturas vegetales o animales que las habitan. La presencia de artistas irá incrementándose en este tipo de empresas de exploración enviadas por España para el reconocimiento de los recursos naturales y el control imperial de sus territorios. Tomamos como punto de partida la expedición de Löfling, en la que los dibujantes naturalistas buscan cumplir con los requisitos del sistema linneano de clasificación, pasando por el caso de Francisco de Requena, que representa el territorio cartográficamente y dibuja la actividad de los propios expedicionarios en los límites con el espacio imperial portugués. Asimismo analizamos las expediciones conocidas como “botánicas” a los diferentes virreinatos, que intentaban transportar la naturaleza americana idealizada en unos “tipos” que se dibujan y graban para dar a conocer las nuevas especies y la riqueza del imperio, hasta llegar a la expedición de Malaspina, en la que se da un paso hacia la representación del paisaje imperial

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“…Drawing was an important tool in botanical practice: for students, it was a tool for developing observational skills; in common practice, a way to record traits which do not fit in herbarium sheets, like cumbersome organs, plant habit and habitat; in expeditions to distant places, it was used to record particularly delicate or perishable features of specimens, like flower colour in orchids (Bleichmar 2006;Francisco-Ortega et al 2015); and as part of the process of acquiring and producing knowledge, since the act of drawing requires the careful observation of the subject in order to select the fundamental aspects of the plants depicted, understanding in this procedure what are the distinguishing characters of the plant and how to synthesise such information (Secord 2002). We believe that Lowe's illustration practice is an example of the latter and that it was part of his methodology to approach the flora of Madeira in his early years.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Richard Thomas Lowe, an unknown Botanical Illustrator

Mesquita¹,

Castel‐Branco²,

Sequeira³

2020

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Illustration is undoubtedly part of botanical history. In the early 19 th century, as botanical Latin yielded more accurate descriptions, the need for illustration in scientific publications decreased. Nevertheless, advances in printing processes boosted the production of illustrated botanical periodicals at accessible costs. Therefore, coloured depictions of plants never ceased to be part of botany at all levels. Richard Thomas Lowe (1802-1874) studied the flora of Madeira from 1826, when he first visited the island, to his death. He is well known as the author of Madeira's first comprehensive Flora, but his work as a botanical illustrator is poorly known. We analysed the graphic production related to his first major paper, published in 1831, along with written documents, which, altogether, support a more complete understanding of Rev. Lowe's botanical work in Madeira and his relevant activity as an illustrator. We believe that joint analysis of illustrations and correspondence show that Lowe himself made the drawings after which the plate of the orchid Goodyera macrophylla in this paper was prepared, whose authorship was, up to now, unknown.

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Painting as Exploration: Visualizing Nature in Eighteenth-Century Colonial Science*

Cited by 43 publications

References 14 publications

Research, Development, and Empire: State Support of Science in the Later Spanish Empire*

Research, Development, and Empire: State Support of Science in the Later Spanish Empire*

Illustrators of the New World. The Image in the Spanish Scientific Expeditions of the Enlightenment

Richard Thomas Lowe, an unknown Botanical Illustrator

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