Mrs. Jane Loudon

Jane Wells Webb Loudon (1807-1858) was an accomplished English author and gardener. Orphaned and penniless at age 17, Jane decided to try to become a writer to support herself. She published a book entitled Prose and Verse in 1826 and then achieved success the next year with an annonymously published novel when she was still only 20. The work, The Mummy!: Or a Tale of the Twenty-Second Century, was the first in what became a popular genre of books about mummies. It was also an early example of science fiction, in which she wrote of the future with imagined changes in society and technology, some of which—like an early form of the internet, air-conditioning and espresso machines—seem prophetic today.

One of Jane’s inventions was a steam-powered digging machine, something which caught the eye of John Claudius Loudon, a well-respected landscape designer, botanist, gardener, author and publisher of Gardener’s Magazine. He asked a friend to invite the author to lunch and was greatly surprised when this turned out to be a woman. The surprise soon turned into love and just seven months later, in 1831, Jane and John married.

Through her marriage, Jane became an enthusiastic gardener and worked closely with her husband in his research and writing, including assisting in editing John's Encyclopedia of Gardening. Jane saw that there was a need for gardening manuals aimed at the growning market of middle-class women, and began a series of guides, including Gardening for Ladies and The Ladies' Companion to the Flower-Garden.

Probably the most famous of her output were the Ladies' Flower Garden books, which were both decorative and educational. Jane had taught herself to draw and these books were illustrated with her designs, beautifully rendered in hand-colored lithographs. These prints are well-known in today's market, but the story of their remarkable creator is undeservedly less well known.

Maria Sibylla Merian

As the step-granddaughter of Johann Theodor de Bry and the daughter of the well-known engraver Matthaus Merian the elder, and then step-daughter of botanical artist Jacob Marrel, Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717) was well suited to become one of the most notable natural history print-makers of either sex. Known not only as an accomplished artist, but also as a respected entomologist. Merian was the first to illustrate the full metamorphoses of many species of butterflies and moths, but her 1699-1701 scientific expedition to South America is one of the most extraordinary stories from the early days of scientific exploration.

From an early age, Maria collected and drew images of insects, taking the innovative approach of looking at the full lifecycle of her subjects. After marrying Johann Andreas Graff, one of Marrel’s apprentices, Maria achieved success as a flower painter and engraver, producing three books of flower prints between 1675 and 1680. Her interest in entomology continued and between 1679 and 1683, she produced Der Raupen wunderbare Verwandelung und sonderbare Blumennahrung, [The Caterpillar’s wondrous metamorphosis and extraordinary nourishment from flowers], which were well received.

Then in 1685, Merian converted to communistic sect of Labadism and left her husband, Johann Graff, moving with her two daughters to the Labadist colony in Holland. This was located in the castle of the Governor of the Dutch Colony of Surinam (Guiana), whose cabinet of exotic butterflies sparked Merian’s imagination to the extent that in 1669, at the age of fifty-two, she set off, with her youngest daughter Dorothea, to study the insects and flora of Surinam.

After two years in the wilderness, recording her observations of plants and the transformations of the native insects, Merian returned to Europe where, in 1705, she produced her important masterpiece, Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium.

This magnificent work documented the insects of Surinam in their full life cycles, each shown with a native plant upon which it lived. The plates blended entomological and botanical elements with an exquisite decorative appearance, providing for Europeans the first extensive visual record of the exotic colors and forms of the plant and insect life of South America, documenting many of the subjects for the first time.

In 1712, Merian began an expanded, Dutch edition of her earlier book on European insects, but this was not completed, for sadly, while in Surinam Maria had contracted a tropical illness, from which she never recovered. In 1715, she suffered a stroke and died in poverty two years later. However, her two daughters worked to complete this work, which was completed in 1717, appearing later in Latin and French editions, the last in 1730.

With all these wonderful volumes, Merian’s work, both as science and art, lives on. In 1991, Germany issued a 500 Deutschemark bill with her likeness on is, and in 2005 named its state-of-the-art research ship the RV Maria S. Merian in her honor.

 Original, antique prints from Merian's publications are rare, but they can still be acquired at reasonable prices. They are a tremendous legacy of this remarkable woman anturalist.

Elizabeth Blackwell, naturalist

Elizabeth Blackwell (1707-1758) of Scotland is not a well-known as the American pioneer doctor of the same name, but she is one of the most famous and impressive early eighteenth-century botanical illustrators. Born Elizabeth Blachrie and trained as an artist, she married her cousin Alexander Blackwell, who though enterprising and well educated, failed in both his Aberdeen medical practice and his London printing shop. Alexander’s excessive spending and fines from his failed business led him into debtor’s prison.

Needing to raise funds to get her husband out of prison, not to mention care for her family and home, Elizabeth came up with an ambitious plan, to create an herbal to document and illustrate the exotic plants of the Old and New World. With her artistic training, Elizabeth could draw the plants and her husband, with his medical background, could provide the proper names and descriptions for the herbal. Encouraged by Sir Hans Sloane and at the recommendation of Isaac Rand, the curator of the Chelsea Physick Garden, Elizabeth took up lodging nearby and drew the plants from the gardens, visiting her husband to get the needed textual information.

Elizabeth not only made the drawings, but she engraved the 500 copper plates and then hand-colored each individually. The resulting A Curious Herbal, published between 1737 and 1739 was successful enough to spring Alexander from prison. [The “curious” in the title is an archaic use of the word, meaning ‘accurate and precise’] Alas, Alexander became involved in more unsuccessful businesses and debts again grew for the Blackwell family. In 1742, hoping to find greener pastures, Alexander moved to Sweden where he was more successful, even being appointed as court physician to Frederick I of Sweden. Still, he managed to reach too far and ended up being convicted of conspiracy of trying to alter the line of Swedish succession and beheaded on July 29th, 1747. In an interesting side-note, he laid his head the wrong way on the chopping block and when corrected by the executioner, noted that he lacked the needed experience as this was his first beheading.

The published product of Elizabeth and Alexander’s labors, though, was an enduring success. It was acclaimed especially by physicians and apothecaries and received the approval of both the Royal College of Physicians and College of Surgeons. Such was the demand for the herbal that two decades after the first edition, botanist and pharmacist Dr. Christoph Jacob Trew reissued the work in a German edition. Prints from the original edition are not only rare and lovely but are testament to determination and skill of the remarkable, Elizabeth Blackwell.

Fanny Palmer

Frances Flora Bond Palmer (1812-1876), usually called Fanny, was perhaps the greatest of the artists who worked for the American printmaker, Nathaniel Currier and then Currier & Ives. She produced over 200 prints, both as the original artist and the lithographer.

Born in England, Fanny was trained in art as a young student at Mary Linwood’s School for young ladies and she later opened a drawing school in Leicester. By 1841, Fanny had formed a lithography business with her husband Edmund Seymour Palmer (called Seymour), Fanny providing the art and lithography and Edmund doing the printing. The couple emigrated to New York City in 1843, where they continued their business as F.&S. Palmer, lithographers. They provided images for a number of works, like the two prints above.

Unfortunately, the business was not successful and in 1849 Fanny began to work for Nathaniel Currier. Currier, known for his keen artistic eye and business sense, soon had Fanny working regularly for his firm. For about two decades, Fanny produced drawings and created lithographic designs on stone for Currier and then Currier & Ives.

Fanny was particularly skilled at architectural drawings, but her landscapes and genre pictures were also excellent. Her early prints often depicted scenes on Long Island, where she lived, but Fanny also created images of places further afield, including locations she never herself visited, such as the American West.

Her work, both in terms of artistic renderings and lithographic skill, is considered to be unsurpassed by any other Currier & Ives artist and her prints remain some of the most popular from the firm.

Recently, Katie Wood Kirchhoff, Associate Curator at the Shelburne Museum, and Dr. Stephanie Delamaire, Associate Curator of Fine Arts at Winterthur Museum and Country Estate, held a very interesting discussion of Fanny Palmer's work. This is available on line, which you can see by clicking on this link.

Louis Kurz

Louis Kurz (1835-1921) was born in Salzburg, Austria, as Ludwig Ferdinand Joseph Kurz von Goldenstein. His family emigrated to Milwaukee in 1848, where his father became involved in the German language theater. Louis’ artistic pursuits began with his painting scenery for his father’s stage productions and he also work with Otto Stietz painting stage scenery for other plays at Milwaukee’s Market Hall.

In 1853, the family moved to Chicago, where Louis worked as a muralist creating “views to decorate numerous entertainment spots” (Peter Marzio, The Democratic Art, p. 178). It was in Chicago that he likely received training in lithography, for when Louis returned to Milwaukee in 1856, he listed himself as “artist and lithographer.” In 1861 he joined with Henry Seifert to form the short-lived lithographic company of Kurz & Seifert, which produced a number of Wisconsin views drawn by Kurz.

Kurz then briefly served in the Civil War and in 1862 returned to Milwaukee to form another lithographic firm, L. Kurz & Company, financially backed by Hans Boebel. It was with this firm that Kurz began his work with tinted lithography and chromolithography, as evidenced by his prints of “Chicago, the Metropolis of the North West” and of the “Madison Engine Company No. 2.”

An 1863 Civil War token calls Louis Kurz a “Pictorial Lithographer,” and in this period he issued a number of finally rendered prints related to the war.

By 1865, Louis Kurz had moved to Chicago and became one of the founders of the Chicago Lithographing Company, along with Otto Jevne and Peter M. Almini. Jevne and Almini were emigrants from Scandinavia who had formed a decorating firm which specialized in fresco painting in a number of Chicago’s buildings. In 1866, the new lithographic firm embarked on the publication of an elaborate portfolio of views drawn by Kurz entitled Chicago Illustrated, intended to be issued in twenty-five parts, each of which was to include at least four tinted lithographs. The project ended in January 1867 after fifty-two images were completed.

A few years later the firm was ended by the great Chicago Fire of 1871, at which time Kurz returned to Milwaukee to found the American Oleograph Company with Hugo Broich. This firm lasted until 1878. After that moved once again to Chicago, and once again founding a new firm, this time with a financial partner named Alexander Allison. This was Kurz’s last new company, the firm of Kurz & Allison surviving until his death in 1921, when its assets were sold to Daleiden and Company.

Kurz & Allison became one of the biggest American lithographic firms of late nineteenth century, particularly well known for its production of bright, decorative chromolithographs. Their avowed purpose was to design “for large scale establishments of all kinds, and in originating and placing on the market artistic and fancy prints of the most elaborate workmanship.” Elaborate they certainly were–the majority of their prints being extremely busy, with action throughout the image. The prints published by Kurz & Allison were drawn, mostly by Kurz, in a rigid style that follows from Kurz’s background as a muralist, these prints have a simplicity and vividness that makes them not only interesting historical and social documents but also excellent large scale decorative images.

Kurz & Allison achieved the pinnacle of their success with prints of Civil War. Inspired by Paul Philppoteaux’s cyclorama of the battle of Gettysburg in 1884 (and directly copying it), Kurz & Allison issued a bright chromolithograph of the battle. This was a period of some nostalgia for the Civil War among veterans, who were now far enough past the actual war to think of their participation with some pride. When Louis Prang began to issue a series of Civil War prints in 1886, Kurz & Allisson reissued their Gettysburg image and began to add others, ending up with a total of 36 Civil War prints by 1893, all issued in a large format size of 21 by 28 inches.

For the most part, the prints were issued on or near the 25th anniversary of the battle depicted. They did not attempt to be strictly accurate, but rather to inspire patriotic feelings. Interestingly, a number of their prints showed the participation of Blacks in the battles, an unusual thing for the period.

Kurz & Allison later did prints of the Spanish-American War and the Russo-Japanese War, as well as portraits, sentimentals, religious images, views and disaster prints. Basically, Kurz & Allison followed the same popular print strategy as Currier & Ives had done earlier in the century, but using mostly chromolithography. When the firm was finally bought out by Dalieden & Co., they advertised the Kurz & Allison prints they continued to sell as “Pictures for the School Room and Hall.”

Thomas Doughty, Printmaker

While Lucien Bonaparte was finishing Alexander Wilson’s American Ornithology, and John James Audubon was beginning his great projects, John and Thomas Doughty produced a book, Cabinet of Natural History and American Rural Sports with Illustrations, that is important both for its many anecdotes about the social impact of natural history and sport in America, but also as the first major book illustrated with color lithographs produced in America.

Though the joint publication of the Doughty brothers, the prints in the work were primarily the offspring of Thomas. Thomas was evidently a self-taught artist, listing himself as a “painter” in the second decade of the nineteenth century, one of the first Americans to list this as an occupation. In the next decade about 40 of his images were used for a variety of publications, but then Thomas, who was an avid outdoor sportsman, conceived of the notion of a color plate work illustrating the natural history of American rural sports. This led to the Cabinet of Natural History and American Rural Sports with Illustrations, where his output reached a new level of vision and quality.

The work, issued in monthly parts, began in 1830, but things changed as the production on the third volume began. At that time, Thomas Doughty left the project to pursue a painting career, gaining immortality as a founder of the Hudson Valley School of painters. His brother, John, took over as sole proprietor, but he soon warned his subscribers that unless he received more support he would have to end the project. This was proved true in 1834 when he discontinued publication with part IV of the third volume.

The first print is an engraving by John Sartain of the “Common Deer,” one of the works done in America by this noted engraver. The rest of the prints were done in the relatively new process of lithography. The artists who produced images for the work were some of the luminaries of the Philadelphia art scene, including M.E.D. Brown, George Lehman, J.G. Cloney, but the major contributor was Thomas Doughty himself. Of particular note are the prints by Titian Ramsay Peale, who upon his return from the Stephen Long expedition to the American West made pictures available of this new American frontier, including his famous image of hunting the American buffalo.

Thomas Nast Christmas Illustrations

Thomas Nast is among the most famous American illustrators of all time, often called the “father of American political cartooning.” Nast was born in Bavaria in 1840 and at six years immigrated with his family to the United States. His father, a musician, had enrolled the artistically precocious child in an art school by age 12. Three years later, Nast was forced to leave his training to help support the family, fortunately gaining work as an illustrator for Frank Leslie’s Weekly. Five years later Nast traveled abroad to cover the Heenan-Sayers fight for the New York Illustrated News, later joining Garibaldi’s forces in Italy as a war correspondent. In 1862, Nast again became a war correspondent, this time for Harper’s Weekly Civil War reporting. His patriotic themes created such attention that President Lincoln cited Nast as his ‘best recruiting sergeant,’ and General Ulysses Grant remarked that Nast “did as much as any one man to preserve the Union and bring the war to an end.”

In the years after the War Between the States, Nast became the most significant illustrator of American political and social issues. His pointed cartoons exerted a great impact on public opinion. Every presidential candidate to gain his support won and his stature increased with the successful campaign in 1870-71 to bring down “Boss” Tweed of New York’s corrupt Tammany Hall and his political machine. More than a mere cartoonist, Nast was an innovator of images, popularizing or instituting many now familiar subjects such as the Republican elephant, the Democratic donkey, John Bull, Uncle Same, and Columbia.

Perhaps his most lasting creation was the image of Santa Claus he developed in a series of cartoons in Harper’s Weekly from 1863 to 1886. Inspired by the description of St. Nicholas in Clement Moore’s 1823 poem ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas, Nast developed his image by using his own beard and rotund belly to eventually create the “jolly old elf” which is our present day image of Santa Claus.

The first image of Santa by Nast was a cover illustration of “Santa Claus in Camp” on January 3, 1863, as well as cameo appearance in the corner of a double page “Christmas Eve” image. At this time Santa was fairly roly-poly and had a long beard, but the theme was more related to Santa’s support of the Union cause-—note the stars and stripes on his costume and he holds a puppet of Jefferson Davis with a noose around his neck.

As time went on, further developed his image, turning Santa into the figure we recognize today. He showed Santa with a workshop at the North Pole, and keeping track of children and their hopes for toys at Christmas. Overall, Nast created 33 cartoons of Santa, the last as a cover image for the December 25, 1886 issue of Harper’s Weekly. After that Nast severed his relationship with Harper’s, but fell into considerable debt through bad investments. In 1901, Theodore Roosevelt was elected President, and wanting to help out the man who had done so much for the country, he appointed Nast as Consul General in Ecuador. Nast died a year later of yellow fever.

Click here to see a selection of Nast Christmas iamges