BOTANICAL AND LEPIDOPTERAL STUDIES

Details

CHINESE SCHOOL, 19TH CENTURY
Botanical and Lepidopteral Studies
An album of approximately 100 leaves painted in watercolour and gouache on paper, depicting various butterflies and moths amongst fruiting and flowering branches, with latin names and Chinese calligraphic descriptions
each leaf 11¾ x 8¾ in. (30 x 22.3 cm.)

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Lot Essay

For a discussion on natural history and botanical watercolours, see Carl L. Crossman, The Decorative Arts of The China Trade, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1991, pp. 182-3, where the author explains that the concern by the Chinese for their native flora and fauna resulted in centuries of accurate representation, and the West, keen to further their knowledge, was a ready market for the fine and detailed studies which the Chinese artist made so accurately, often in large albums such as the present lot, during the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

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