 |
|
|
|
|
TRAVIÈS, Edouard (1809-1865)
Blackbird and young (Turdus merula) `17. / Le Merle. (Buffon) Turdus Merula (Linnèe) Grandeur naturelle/ Europe'
Paris: Ledot ainé, [circa 1857]. Lithograph, coloured by hand, by Traviès. Sheet size: 24 1/8 x 17 1/4 inches.
A fine lithograph by one of the greatest ornithological artists of the 19th century, from his finest work 'Les Oiseaux Les Plus Remarquables.'
In this lively scene, full of movement, a male blackbird is shown presenting a caterpillar to his hungry brood of four young . Blackbirds often produce two broods a year, the first in about April and a second in June. To judge from the age of the hatchlings and the state of the surrounding foliage, this is probably a summer brood.
Edouard Traviès was the first artist to successfully capture the character of individual birds. This together with the wealth of detail in the backgrounds, give great charm to his images and lift them above mere ornithological illustration, into the realm of fine ornithological art.
Traviès was born in Doullens in the Somme district of France in March 1809, the younger brother of the caricaturist Charles Joseph Traviès de Villier (1804-1859). Throughout his career he concentrated on natural history subjects, both in watercolour (he exhibited regularly at the Paris Salon between 1831 and 1866) and lithography, as here. Unlike a number of his contemporaries, he was an artist both with the brush and on stone, and the present lithograph is his own work. It comes from what is undoubtedly his greatest published work: 'Les Oiseaux Les Plus Remarquables par leurs formes et leurs coleurs. Scenes variees de leurs moeurs & de leur habitudes...' published simultaneously in Paris and London circa 1857.
|
#3559 $2,500.00 
|
© 2002-2005 Donald A. Heald
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
