Synopses & Reviews
Floral forms: The finest work of the "Raphael of flowers" The tradition of botanical illustration reaches back to the Renaissance. It reflected a desire to document nature in all its detail, variety and splendour, and demanded the most precise skill of an artist.
French flower painter Pierre-Joseph Redouté (1759–1840) devoted himself exclusively to the botanical arts, capturing the diversity of flowering plants in watercolor paintings which were then published as stipple engravings. A darling of Parisian high society, he was dubbed “the Raphael of flowers”, with a network of élite patrons includingNapoleon's Josephine.
Now, TASCHEN reprints Redouté's Choix des plus belles fleures et quelques branches des plus beaux fruits(Selection of the Most Beautiful Blooms and Branches with the Finest Fruits), in which the artist gathered 144 hand-colored stipple engravings of his finest work. First issued between 1827 and 1833, the collection showcases Redouté's combination of exquisite elegance and accuracy as he roamed Parisian gardens and greenhouses to record delicate plant specimens from all over the world. His tender precision is as delightful as it is informative, transporting the reader to an era of bygone magnificence and botanical discovery. Text in English, French, and German
Synopsis
He was known as the Raphael of flowers and rightly so: Pierre-Joseph Redoute (1759-1840) devoted himself exclusively to the task of capturing the diversity of the flowering plants in naturalistic watercolor paintings. He worked in Paris as a botanical illustrator for rich and influential patrons, during which he documented remarkable, rare plants and flora new to the science of his day. Nearly all of his watercolors were published as copper engravings in large formats and launched on the market with botanical descriptions as sumptuously designed publications in small editions that are today superlative collectors items. The Choix des plus belles fleures et quelques branches des plus beaux fruits (Selection of the Most Beautiful Blooms and Branches with the Finest Fruits), issued in 36 parts between 1827 and 1833) is a late work of Redoute, in which he published 144 hand-colored stipple engravings of his best representations of flora in revised form along with a few novelty items.
Synopsis
Flower Power: The finest work of the "Raphael of flowers" Redoute was forever in high demand. Official court draftsman to Queen Marie-Antoinette (who purportedly summoned him at midnight to paint a cactus), and later a favorite of Josephine Bonaparte, the artist brought flowers to the highest of places, and offset the chaotic upheaval of the French Revolution with the delicacy of perfectly drawn petals.
This reprint brings together 144 examples of Redoute's flower, branch, and fruit drawings. Originally published between 1827 and 1833, these precise yet tender illustrations are as delightful as they are informative, recording some of the most delicate plant specimens in the world and evoking the beauty of defunct Parisian greenhouses and gardens.
Text in English, French, and German
Synopsis
Pierre-Joseph Redout (1759-1840) devoted himself exclusively to the task of capturing the diversity of flowering plants in naturalistic watercolor paintings, collected in this comprehensive volume.
Synopsis
Flower Power: The finest work of the "Raphael of flowers" Redouté was forever in high demand. Official court draftsman to Queen Marie-Antoinette (who purportedly summoned him at midnight to paint a cactus), and later a favorite of Joséphine Bonaparte, the artist brought flowers to the highest of places, and offset the chaotic upheaval of the French Revolution with the delicacy of perfectly drawn petals.
This reprint brings together 144 examples of Redouté’s flower, branch, and fruit drawings. Originally published between 1827 and 1833, these precise yet tender illustrations are as delightful as they are informative, recording some of the most delicate plant specimens in the world and evoking the beauty of defunct Parisian greenhouses and gardens.
Text in English, French, and German
About the Author
Pierre-Joseph Redouté (1759-1840), was born in Saint-Hubert, now part of Belgium. An official court artist at Versailles, he gained international recognition for his watercolors of flowers and plants, publishing over 2,000 plates depicting over 1,800 dspecies. Redouté perfected the technique of stipple engraving, using tiny dots of color rather than lines, facilitating subtle color variations in his work.Werner Dressendörfer is a pharmaceutical historian and academic librarian. He taught at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, where he was an honorary professor. His particular spheres of interest are the history of the Early Modern herbal, the cultural history of useful and medicinal plants, and plant symbolism in art. He has published extensively on pharmaceutical and botanical history. He is the author of TASCHEN's The Garden at Eichstätt, The Lilies, Leonhart Fuchs: The New Herbal of 1543, Pomona Britannica, The Temple of Flora and The Vegetable Garden.H. Walter Lack is a Professor at the Free University of Berlin and former Director of the Botanical Gardens and Botanical Museum in Berlin-Dahlem. A leading expert in the history of botany, his research focuses on the global transfer of useful and ornamental plants from a cultural historical perspective. He is the author of TASCHEN's Garden of Eden and The Book of Palms.