Fries, Adolph

Mongooses beside mango plants, ravens beside corals: prints by Adolph Fries bring together plants, insects, birds and mammal...

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Mongooses beside mango plants, ravens beside corals: prints by Adolph Fries bring together plants, insects, birds and mammals in the alphabetical order of a French natural-history dictionary. Fries was a scientific illustrator and printmaker of the early nineteenth century, and the material here dates from the 1830s. His designs pair recognisable whole animals with smaller anatomical or botanical details, and other sheets group lizards or cypresses by their French names, so the creatures share a plate because of the alphabet rather than any natural habitat. Birds of paradise, cockatoos, turtles, sharks and marsupials widen the range. Engravers translated his drawings into plates, so designer and engraver may be credited separately.

Mongooses beside mango plants, ravens beside corals: prints by Adolph Fries bring together plants, insects, birds and mammals in the alphabetical order of a French natural-history dictionary. Fries was a scientific illustrator and printmaker of the early nineteenth century, and the material here dates from the 1830s. His designs pair recognisable whole animals with smaller anatomical or botanical details, and other sheets group lizards or cypresses by their French names, so the creatures share a plate because of the alphabet rather than any natural habitat. Birds of paradise, cockatoos, turtles, sharks and marsupials widen the range. Engravers translated his drawings into plates, so designer and engraver may be credited separately.

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