Guntars Sietins

Characters XVIII ∞-C

2016

Medium: mezzotint with aquatint Image Size: 8.6 x 10.25 inches Edition of 35 Year: 2016 The illusions and reflections in Sietins prints often bring M.C. Escher to mind, but his prin...

The illusions and reflections in Sietens prints often bring M.C. Escher to mind, but his prints have a distinctive feel all their own. His surreal constructions of Kastani (chestnut...

In "Late Night", Frederick Mershimer created a winter scene where Berkeley Place meets Seventh Avenue in Brooklyn's Park Slope. This image, the seventh in t...

Magnificent print by Robert John Thornton. Aquatint and mezzotint, printed in colour and finished by hand, heightened with gum arabic, from The Temple of Flora. [London 1799] First state. Thornton was a prolific medical author and Doctor of Medicine, practicing at St Andrews University and licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians. However, he is best remembered for this great botanical publication The Temple of Flora, which formed a part of the larger work - New Illustration of the Sexual system of Linnaeus. In 1797, he also began advertising for subscribers to his planned natural history publishing venture, which eventually comprised of 30 folio botanical plates. For these remarkable illustrations, he engaged the services of the leading artists and engravers of his day: Sir William Beechey, James Opie, Henry Raeburn, John Russell, Philip Reinagle and others as painters; Francesco Bartolozzi, Richard Earlom and John Landseer. Most of the images were painted by Peter Charles Henderson and Philip Reinagle. These botanical illustrations are unique as they were the first flower prints with landscape backgrounds, depicting the natural habitat of the plant. The life-size flowers stand out dramatically and the whole effect is startlingly modern. Thornton's announced intention was to make this work the most magnificent tribute ever paid to the famous Swedish botanist Linnaeus by illustrating his Sexual System with the finest possible prints. All these were engraved on a larger scale than anything which had hitherto appeared and then were printed in colour, an expensive and uncommon method in England at this time. A brilliant effect. This rare and celebrated plate of the Roses...