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JAY T. SNIDER COLLECTION OF ILLUSTRATED MANUSCRIPTS
FEDERBILD – An album of featherwork ornithological illustrations. Egerland, c.1830.
Details
FEDERBILD – An album of featherwork ornithological illustrations. Egerland, c.1830.
228 x 303mm. 13 leaves of watercolor and collage illustrations, with ink labels on verso (page edges strengthened; one pressed flower detached with one illustration missing some feathers). Contemporary blindstamped brown cloth (some light staining on boards); in modern box. Provenance: Donald Heald Rare Books.
Portraits of German birds made from their own feathers. German featherwork—or federbild—was a major craft art and export of the Egerland region, introduced at the end of the eighteenth century by the Dominican monk Hieronymus Trötscher. An ingenious combination of watercolor with paper and feather collage, this technique is associated with the sentimental, folksy style of the Biedermeier period. While there is a clear line of influence from the Naturselbstdruck (nature-printing) tradition of the previous century, Trötscher may also have also been inspired by the intricate featherwork mosaics created by Mexican artists in the New World. Mexican featherwork had enjoyed an earlier popularity in Renaissance Europe, adopted for cabinets of curiosities and the luxury book arts; the natural historian Ulisse Aldrovandi described the art form as a "threshold between art and science."
228 x 303mm. 13 leaves of watercolor and collage illustrations, with ink labels on verso (page edges strengthened; one pressed flower detached with one illustration missing some feathers). Contemporary blindstamped brown cloth (some light staining on boards); in modern box. Provenance: Donald Heald Rare Books.
Portraits of German birds made from their own feathers. German featherwork—or federbild—was a major craft art and export of the Egerland region, introduced at the end of the eighteenth century by the Dominican monk Hieronymus Trötscher. An ingenious combination of watercolor with paper and feather collage, this technique is associated with the sentimental, folksy style of the Biedermeier period. While there is a clear line of influence from the Naturselbstdruck (nature-printing) tradition of the previous century, Trötscher may also have also been inspired by the intricate featherwork mosaics created by Mexican artists in the New World. Mexican featherwork had enjoyed an earlier popularity in Renaissance Europe, adopted for cabinets of curiosities and the luxury book arts; the natural historian Ulisse Aldrovandi described the art form as a "threshold between art and science."