Friday, December 28, 2007

Cabinet of Natural Curiosities, Taschen Books

I'm back! This beautiful image is from a delightful book that I received for Xmas. (Thanks, Raliegh!) The book is called "Cabinet of Natural Curiosities" published by Taschen Books. It's a hefty book of 446 copperplates in color. The illustrations, originally published between 1764 and 1765, are of Albertus Seba's collection of natural specimens. Albertus was an apothecary living in Amsterdam. He was born in 1665 and died in 1736, but before he died he commissioned illustrators to document his collection and the results are nothing short of amazing. Each page of this book is a well-designed, surrealist's dream. Each combines scientific details of nature with the honesty of folk art. I love it. Here's a link to the book:
P.S. I'm working on my regular website right now, so don't be alarmed if pages are missing. It's temporary.
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