Birds Drawn For John Gould Edward Lear David Attenborough Signed Folio Society
$ 2624.89
Description
Illustrations of Birds Drawn for John Gould by Edward Lear, collected and introduced by David Attenborough. The Folio Society 2012. The book is near fine, the solander case is very good with some faint scuff marks and bumping to one corner. This release would have originally come with an additional loose print of an eagle owl, however, it is not present here. Edward Lear, the 20th child in his family, suffered from a number of lifelong health problems, including epilepsy, bronchitis and asthma. When he was a child, his family got into financial trouble, and he was required to leave the family home from a young age, where he was raised by his sister, 21 years his senior. His sisters taught him to paint, and from his early teens he began to make money drawing sketches, also taking on work drawing medical illustrations. At the age of 18 was employed at The Zoological Society to produce ornithological drawings. Lear had already met John Audubon, who had just published Birds of America in double elephant folio size, and Lear wanted to create his own large format book - Illustrations of The Family Psittacidae, or Parrots. He set out to create 175 copies to be sold in 14 issues to subscribers, however, it ultimately failed financially and was never completed. During this time, John Gould was curator and head preserver at The Zoological Society of London, where he became aware of Lear's talents. Gould was a successful businessman and had his own taxidermy company. With Lear in financial trouble, the two came to a deal where Lear would to draw for Gould. Gould also acquired the rights to Lear's failed work, with some of the illustrations later appearing in his famed Birds of Europe book. The deal would enable Lear to travel to zoos across Europe to create his drawings from live specimens, rather than stuffed animals as was commonly the case at the time. Lear used lithography, rather than copper etching that many of his predecessors had used. The lithography technique allowed for extra fine details, and Lear would often be seen carrying these great slabs of limestone to work on. He would draw directly onto the stone, rather the usual way of copying from paper, perhaps to save time and money, or perhaps feeling that it gave the works more life. Lear went on to become one of the most respected figures in the field of ornithological drawings, but his work was always published alongside other artists. From the age of 35, Lear’s eyesight started to fail, leaving him less able to pick out the fine details required for his ornithological drawings, so he then focused primarily on landscapes, the nonsense works, and travel. In 1954, while researching for his Zoo Quest TV series and books, David Attenborough bought a box of bird prints and was struck by one in particular, of a toucan, signed E Lear. Attenborough became a huge admirer of Lear's work and over the course of many years collected prints of all 80 bird portraits that Lear had drawn for Gould. Attenborough had these bound into a single volume in a 19th century leather binding. Attenborough felt that Lear's exceptional ornithological drawings deserved to be published alone, and, to celebrate 200 years since Lear's birth, The Folio Society reproduced Attenborough's collection in facsimile. Limited to 780 copies, this stunning imperial folio size (21½x14¼ inches) book is bound in full Nigerian goatskin leather, lavishly decorated in gilt to the front and back, spine, edges, and inside edges, top edge gilt, with hand marbled endpapers, 80 lithographs in high quality reproduction, 184 pages total, signed and with an introduction by David Attenborough. Presented in a strong buckram solander case. A beautiful book, perhaps the most beautiful produced by The Folio Society.
Excellent book! Exactly as pictured and described. The listing was thorough and accurate in identifying all the relevant first edition points. The item shipped quickly and arrived carefully packaged. Seller was very responsive in looking into a brief shipping delay caused by US Customs.
This book was exactly as described maybe even better. The packaging was very nice it felt like a real unboxing. The shipping was very fast. And the book was a great price. Over all the book is exactly what I wanted it to be and was very worth the money.
Perfect service all around and magnificent book. As soon as box was opened I was in awe at the condition of the book. As described.
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