CAMPANVLA (Bellflowers)
Date1757-1764
Artist
Johann Hieronymus Kniphof
OriginEurope, Germany, Erfurt
MediumInk and watercolor on laid paper
DimensionsOverall: 12 11/16 × 7 9/16in. (32.2 × 19.2cm)
Credit LineMuseum Purchase
Object number2008-44,6
DescriptionLower margin reads: "CAMPANVLA caule ramosissimo diffuso, foliis oblongis/subcrenatis, calycibus solitariis corolla longioribus/capsulis prismaticis. Linn. S. P. 168. Ludw. D. G. P. 63./Speculum Veneris."Label TextIn 1729, Johann Hieronymus Kniphof, a professor, doctor, and keeper of the botanic garden in Erfurt, Germany, developed a new method for creating botanical images. Kniphof’s process used the plant itself to produce an exact image. After the plant was harvested, he pressed and dried it. Once it dried, he applied ink directly to the specimen and rolled it through a printing press. In an early report he explained “the manifest economic advantages the process had compared with botanical books illustrated with woodcuts or copper plates.” Previously botany texts had used inefficient woodblock prints, which lost detail, or copper plates, which became too costly. This new process of nature printing allowed for the plant to be depicted more affordably in an as true-to-life manner as possible.
The print depicts a large Venus's-looking-glass, a flower within the bellflower family.
1757-1764
1757-1764
1800-1827 (compiled); some 1726
1824-1828 (range of the entires in the album).
1757-1764
1757-1764
1757-1764
1757-1764
1860-1880
1655-1656