“Wild Turkey,” M.E.D. Brown
This summer the Albrecht-Kemper Museum of Art will display the complete collection of hand-colored lithographs from The Cabinet of Natural History, the first major book project in the United States with lithographic illustrations. It was produced by Thomas Doughty and his brother John in Philadelphia between 1830 and 1833 and featured 54 colored illustrations. The exhibition is curated by Lee Silliman from his private collection of prints. His decades of experience as a photographer of the American West and as a photo archivist and curator at the Powell County Museum & Arts Foundation in Deer Lodge, Montana, have influenced his interest in the historical images of America’s wildlife and landscapes.
Collected in three volumes, the publication The Cabinet of Natural History, and American Rural Sports featured extensive scientific descriptions of the birds and mammals of North America along with articles about outdoor life and sporting activities. Thomas Doughty, a pioneer of American landscape painting and the Hudson River School, created about half of the animal images that accompanied the articles. Others were done by artists and printmakers like M.E.D. Brown, Alexander Rider and Cephas G. Childs. The refinement of the lithographic process and printing techniques made richly illustrated books available to a much wider audience than before. John James Audubon was producing his Birds of America folio in England at the same time, and George Catlin would publish his North American Indian portfolio in the 1840s.
The interest in such publications was an extension of the early 19th century interest in both natural history and exploration of a young country. The Academy of Natural Sciences was founded in Philadelphia in 1812 to provide a meeting place for naturalists. Government sponsored expeditions, like those of Lewis and Clark, Zebulon Pike and Stephen Long were often accompanied by artists and collected specimens of animals for study. The illustrations in The Cabinet of Natural History were based on these specimens on display in locations like the Peale Philadelphia Museum, written descriptions by naturalists, and from observation of animals on display. By the 1820s travelling menageries exhibiting living animals like polar bears, grizzly bears and coyotes were popular entertainment in the cities of America.
The Cabinet of Natural History, America’s First Colored Lithographic Project, 1830-1833 will be on exhibit from June 21 through Sept. 14. More information about this exhibition and related programming can be found at albrecht-kemper.org.
Financial assistance provided by the St. Joseph, Missouri Visitors Bureau and the Missouri Arts Council
