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TRAVIÈS, Edouard (1809-1865)
House Martin (Delichon urbica) `32./ L'Hirondelle au croupion blanc, ou l'Hirondelle de fenêtre.(Buffon.). Grandeur naturelle/ Hirundo Urbica. (Linnée)/ Europe'
Paris & London: Berrieux and Gambert, Junin & Co, [circa 1857]. Lithograph, coloured by hand, by Traviès, printed by Lemercier of Paris. Sheet size: 21 1/8 x 14 5/8 inches.
A fine lithograph by one of the greatest ornithological artists of the 19th century, from his finest work 'Les Oiseaux Les Plus Remarquables.'
Along with the Swallow and Swift, the House Martins are harbingers of summer. Here the birds, having made the incredible journey from southern Africa, are shown in amongst the urban roofs of a French town or city. In the foreground, an individual skims the top of a Horse Chestnut in its search for insects, behind securely attached to the eaves a young bird looks out from a mud nest to be fed by its parent. The feeling of heat, the strong summer light and the evocative wheeling cry of these accomplished fliers are all suggested in this gentle scene.
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.
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#3566 $1,500.00 
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© 2002-2005 Donald A. Heald
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