Joseph Smit (4)
Birds


These hand-finished chromolithographs are by the accomplished Joseph Smit (1836-1929) and cut from  Philip Sclater's  Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum (BM), Volume 9, published in 1886.  Born in the Netherlands, Smit was invited to Britain by Philip Sclater in 1866 and did the lithography for Sclater's Exotic Ornithology.  He also did the lithography for Joseph Wolf's Zoological Sketches (second series), as well as Daniel Elliott's monographs on the Phasianeidae and Paradiseida.   Smit contributed regularly to the Transactions and the Proceedings of the Zoological Society, Ibis, and The Field.  Beginning in the 1870s, he worked on the massive Catalogue of Birds in the Museum, and later on the Lord Lilford's Coloured Figures of the Birds in the British Museum.

    The fringilliform plates below come from a volume that was bumped on the upper right corner.  As a result, the         plates have a small bend in that area.  This bend, which can be generally matted out, accounts for the Excellent         minus rating .  The plates have mild toning around the edges consistent with their age.  The background may not be a white as the scans suggest.

"Considered . . . the best animal painter in England after the death of J. Wolf" -- S. Peter Dance.

 
8.5 x 5.25 inches (BM)

jcorwin@classicnatureprints

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