Maria Sibylla Merian - Resources for Botanical Art Lovers
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Maria Sibylla Merian (1647 - 1717) - Woman of Art and Science
Maria Sibylla Merian was a Naturalist, Entymologist and Botanical Illustrator and is rated as being one of the greatest ever botanical artists.
This site will be of interest to all botanical and natural history artists and all those who enjoy art which records nature, plants and insect life.
This site provides an overview of her life and work and designed to be a compendium of links to biographies and books about her life and work.
Plus online galleries and exhibitions which display her work.
All images sources from Wikimedia
You can find out about................
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- Biography of Maria Sibylla Merian
- Maria Sibylla Merian and Daughters: Women of Art and Science
- Exhibitions of Maria Sibylla Merian's work
- BOOK: Insects and Flowers: The Art of Maria Sibylla Merian
- BOOK: Merian's Antique Botanical Prints
- Online galleries of the work of Maria Sibylla Merian
- Merian - Prints to purchase
- Articles and blog posts about Maria Sybilla Meria
- Comments and Suggestions
Bookmark This Resource
New links are being added to this site on a regular basis
A Parrot Tulip, Auriculas, and Red Currants, with a Magpie Moth, its Caterpillar and Pupa
Biography of Maria Sibylla Merian
April 2, 1647 - January 13, 1717)
Maria Sibylla Merian was a Swiss naturalist and artist living and working in the seventeenth century. She excelled in both endeavours.
One of her principal claims to fame is that she is one of the first naturalists to have studied insects. She recorded and illustrated the life cycles of 186 insect species. Her evidence documented the nature of metamorphosis and contradicted contemporary ideas about how insects developed. She also discovered unknown animals and insects in the interior of Surinam. Her classification of butterflies and moths is still used today.
She also undertook scientific expeditions at a time when these were unusual and normally undertaken by men only.
April 2, 1647: born Frankfurt, Germany to a family of Swiss heritage
1651: Her stepfather encourages her to paint
1660: She begins to paint images of insects and plants from specimens she had captured. Throughout her life she kept specimens and studied their life cycles.
1665: She marries and shortly afterwards has her first child. She continued to paint and also taught painting. Her specimens came from gardens.
1675: Publishes her first collection of engravings - Neues Blumenbuch - New book of flowers
1677: Publishes her second collection of engravings - Der Raupen wunderbare Verwandlung und sonderbare Blumennahrung -- The Caterpillar, Marvelous Transformation and Strange Floral Food. In this set of engravings she demonstrated the life cycle of the butterfly and how it transforms from a caterpillar to a butterfly.
1680: Publishes her third collection of engravings
1685: Merian leaves her husband and moved to a religious commune which practiced celibacy with her mother and two daughters. She lived in a home owned by Cornelis van Sommelsdijk, the governor of Surinam. This enabled her to begin her studies of the tropical flora and fauna of Surinam and South America.
1690: Her mother dies and she moves to Amsterdam. Her daughter subsequently marries and moves to Surinam - a Dutch colony.
1699: The city of Amsterdam sponsors Merian to go on a trip to Surinam with her daughter. She travels around the area now known as French, Dutch and British Guianas for two years. Her work involves sketching the plant life, animals and insects.
1701: Merian returns to Amsterdam due to malaria. She sells the specimens she has collected and begins her preparations to produce and publish a collection of engravings about the life in Surinam. Between 1701 and 1705 she makes 60 copperplate engravings to illustrate the stages of insect development, arranged around the cultivated and wild plants she had encountered on her travels.
1705: Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium, her illustrated book about the Insects of Surinam is published in Dutch and Latin. With its detailed text and imagery, the Metamorphosis is the first work on the natural history of Surinam.
1715: Merian suffers a stroke after which she is partially paralysed and subsequently becomes a pauper as she is unable to work
January 13, 1717: she dies in Amsterdam.
A collection of her work - Erucarum Ortus Alimentum et Paradoxa Metamorphosis - is published posthumously
Latterly her artwork has become extremely popular and is held by many prestigious collections - including the Royal Collection.
Below you can find links to more information about her life
- Maria Sibylla Merian
- A biography of Maria Sibylla Merian - with links to reference sites
- Natural History Exhibit Chronological Tour - Maria Sibylla Merian
- Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717) learned to paint from her stepfather, the still life artist Jacob Marrel.
She was interested in flowers and insects from an early age, and published books of her paintings, showing insects in different stages of their development, - The Flowering Genius of Maria Sibylla Merian by Ingrid D. Rowland | The New York Review of Books
- Extensive essay on the life and work of Merian within the context of the exhibition at the Rembrandt House Museum, Amsterdam, February 23-May 18, 2008, and the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, June 10-August 31, 2008.
- Maria Sibylla Merian, a Gift Person essay by Linda Fisher
- Artist and Entomologist (1647-1717) "Not for my own glory, but for the glory of God alone, who created such wonders."
- Maria Sibylla Merian - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- Maria Sibylla Merian (born April 2, 1647 in Frankfurt - died January 13, 1717 in Amsterdam) was a naturalist and scientific illustrator who studied plants and insects and made detailed paintings about them. Her detailed observations and documentation of the metamorphosis of the butterfly make her a significant, albeit not well known, contributor to entomology.
- Maria Sibylla Merian: Uncovering the Legend of an 18th century naturalist
- Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717) was a German naturalist and scientific illustrator who studied plants and insects. Saying she was a scientific illustrator really doesn't do it justice, however; she is renowned for her intricate and intimate portraits of plants, butterflies, and insects at a time when the illustration was the only way to convey the plant in its natural habitat.
- National Museum of Womenin the Arts - Maria sibylla Merian
- Artist Profile
Artist Portfolio
Maria Sibylla Merian German - Maria Sibylla Merian artist - naturalist | Magazine Antiques | Find Articles at BNET.com
- Maria Sibylla Merian artist - naturalist
Article about Merian and her work in Magazine Antiques in Home & Garden (2000)
provided free by Find Articles. - Maria Sibylla Merian: Biography from Answers.com
- Maria Sibylla Merian ( b Frankfurt am Main, 2 April 1647; d Amsterdam, 13 Jan 1717).
- Strange Science - Maria Sibylla Merian
- In a world of natural history generalists, Maria Sibylla Merian, (also known as Maria Sybilla Merian) was a specialist, concentrating almost her entire life on how moths and butterflies metamorphosed from caterpillars. In her early 50s, she followed her passion halfway around the world and risked death from disease to study these bugs in their natural habitat.
VIDEO: Maria Sibylla Merian (De Europische Insecten)
A wonderful slideshow of the artwork of Maria Sibylla Merian
Ananas mit Kakerlake (Pineapple with cockroach)
Maria Sibylla Merian and Daughters: Women of Art and Science
by Ella Reitsma
This gorgeously illustrated book presents the life and work of Maria Sibylla Merian, who defied the conventions of her time to pursue her passion for documenting the natural world in all its glorious, and sometimes ferocious, detail.
After more than fifteen years of marriage to a fellow artist and the birth of two daughters, Merian left her husband. She began to support herself by selling watercolors of insects, fruit, and flowers, eventually establishing an art business in Amsterdam with her daughters, Johanna Helen and
Dorothea Maria.
Merian's innovative compositional style--displaying the life cycle of an insect against the background of its host plant--developed out of her own careful and painstakingly recorded observations of insect metamorphoses.
Maria Sibylla Merian and Daughters: Women of Art and Science
Amazon Price: $225.00 (as of 02/16/2012)
Ella Rietsma is the first author to attempt to separate Merian's work from that of her two daughters, who collaborated extensively with their mother. Reitsma also includes newly discovered drawings and fresh biographical details. This book - published by Getty Publications (June 15, 2008) - coincides with an exhibition of Merian's work on view at the J. Paul Getty Museum from June 10 through August 31, 2008.
Exhibitions of Maria Sibylla Merian's work
Merian's work has recently been included in a number of prominent and popular exhibitions about botanical and natural history art
- Royal Collection - Amazing Rare Things
- Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717) was one of the greatest artist-naturalists of her time.
From childhood she had been fascinated by the life cycles of butterflies, and she made a close study of their transformations. She became a flower-painter and teacher in Nuremberg, Frankfurt and Amsterdam.
Inspired by exotic specimens imported from the Dutch colonies for the natural history collections of Holland, in 1699, at the age of fifty-two, Merian made an expedition to Surinam (Dutch Guiana) in South America. Her aim was to study the indigenous flora and fauna in their tropical habitat. On her return to Amsterdam two years later, she began work on a lavishly illustrated book, the Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium ('The Metamorphoses of the Insects of Surinam', published in 1705), depicting the life cycles of the region's insects.
The exhibition includes de luxe watercolours (painted on vellum) of the plates of the Metamorphosis. The 95 watercolours by Merian in the Royal Collection were bought in 1755 by George III, when Prince of Wales. - Getty Center: Maria Sibylla Merian & Daughters: Women of Art and Science
- Maria Sibylla Merian & Daughters: Women of Art and Science
June 10-August 31, 2008
This is the first major exhibition of Merian's work in America.
Maria Sibylla Merian (German, 1647-1717) was a pioneering woman of art, science, and business. She was an accomplished painter of flowers and insects and an entomologist from an early age. In her fifties, she traveled to Suriname, then a Dutch colony in South America, to study extraordinary insects first hand. Working with her two daughters, Merian made and produced one of the greatest illustrated natural history books of all time, The Insects of Suriname. This exhibition introduces Maria Sibylla Merian to American audiences and focuses on natural history illustration, which is one of the most accessible and engaging art forms. Co-organized by the J. Paul Getty Museum and the Museum Het Rembrandthuis, the exhibition travels to Los Angeles after its presentation in Amsterdam and is accompanied by a fully-illustrated catalogue. - Merian and Daughters: Women of Art and Science (Getty Center Exhibitions)
- Exhibition slideshow
- Maria Sibylla Merian & Daughters (Getty Press Release)
- February 20, 2008 press release announcing the Merian exhibition at the Getty Museum. Contains details about both Merian, her work and the exhibition
- Making a Mark: Maria Sibylla Merian - at the Getty Museum, Buckingham Palace and Kew Gardens
- Maria Sibylla Merian was both a Naturalist and a Botanical Illustrator. She's rated as being one of the greatest ever artists of botanical and entomological subjects. Her profile has never been higher - and she currently features significantly in three major exhibitions in the USA and London.
BOOK: Maria Sibylla Merian: Insects of Surinam
by: Katharina Schmidt-Loske
RECOMMENDED - I own this book and it fulfils Taschen's normal high standards of quality content and production
This TASCHEN reprint of a hand-colored first edition copy of Merian's pioneering achievement and major work Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium includes the complete plates and a commentary by Katharina Schmidt-Loske.
A genuine first edition recently sold at Christies for £145,000
Maria Sibylla Merian: Insects of Surinam
Amazon Price: $26.00 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $39.99
Hardcover: 192 pages
Publisher: TASCHEN America Llc; Mul edition (October 1, 2009)
Amazon ratings: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review) | Like (3)
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BOOK: Insects and Flowers: The Art of Maria Sibylla Merian
by: David Brafman, Stephanie Schrader
Reproduces JUST 16 plates from a second edition of Metamorphosis of the Insects of Suriname (1705) which is held in the Getty research Institute
(IMPORTANT NOTE: Compare the price and format to the Taschen book listed above - which reproduced all the plates from a first edition of the same book)
Insects and Flowers: The Art of Maria Sibylla Merian
Amazon Price: $5.70 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $9.95
Used Price: $5.94
Paperback: 52 pages
Publisher: J. Paul Getty Museum; 1 edition (September 8, 2008)
Amazon ratings: 3.8 out of 5 stars (4 customer reviews) | Like (13)
Complaints from some reviewers that the format is too small which doesn't suit the reproductions and hence the price is too much.
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Insects of Surinam
from Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium (1705)
BOOK: Chrysalis: Maria Sibylla Merian and the Secrets of Metamorphosis
by Kim Todd
Kim Todd has restored Merian to her rightful place in the beautifully written and illustrated Chrysalis. Taking us from golden-age Amsterdam to the sweltering rain forests of Surinam to the modern laboratories where Merian's insights fuel a new branch of biology, Kim Todd brings to life an amazing seventeenth-century woman whose boldness and vision would still be exceptional today.
Chrysalis: Maria Sibylla Merian and the Secrets of Metamorphosis
Amazon Price: $0.87 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $15.00
Paperback: 352 pages
Publisher: Mariner Books (December 3, 2007)
Amazon ratings: 4.7 out of 5 stars (9 customer reviews) | Like (2)
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BOOK: Maria Sibylla Merian: The St. Petersburg Watercolors
by Eckhard Hollmann
The magnificent watercolours of Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717) have been kept at the Academy of Science in St. Petersburg for centuries. Prestel recently published a faithful reproduction.
Maria Sibylla Merian: The St. Peteresburg Watercolors
Amazon Price: $445.00 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $85.00
Used Price: $165.00
Hardcover: 160 pages
Publisher: Prestel Publishing (November 2003)
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BOOK: Maria Sibylla Merian: The New Book of Flowers
Maria Sibylla Merian publsihed her first book - The Book of Flowers - in Nuremburg between 1675 and 1680 in three volumes of twelve sheets. She also marketed it herself.
It enjoyed enormous access leading her to reprint and colour all 36 plates, and add a preface before publishing it in 1680 as the New Book of Flowers.
She identified the publication as being intended as an inspiration to others: "In that it may be useful for traveling and painting, and for the women to sew, and all lovers of art for benefit and joy."
Maria Sibylla Merian: The New Book of Flowers (Prestel Art)
Amazon Price: $81.59 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $29.95
Hardcover: 96 pages
Publisher: Prestel Publishing; Facsimile edition edition (April 1999)
Amazon ratings: 4.5 out of 5 stars (4 customer reviews)
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Metamorphosis of a Butterfly
BOOK: Flowers, Butterflies and Insects: All 154 Engravings from "Erucarum Ortus"
a Dover Pictorial Archive publication
This book is typical of Dover publications and comprises complete full pages of fine-line images of roses, butterflies, tulips, caterpillars, and other specimens of plant and insect life in elegant full-page compositions. These plates replicate the engravings and are reprinted from the classic and influential works of the famous entomologist and natural history/botanical artist Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717). New English captions.
Flowers, Butterflies and Insects: All 154 Engravings from "Erucarum Ortus" (Dover Pictorial Archive)
Amazon Price: $8.49 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $14.95
Paperback: 160 pages
Publisher: Dover Publications (June 1, 1991)
Amazon ratings: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review) | Like (2)
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BOOK: Merian's Antique Botanical Prints
a Dover Pictorial Archive publication
black-and-white images of insects and plants by an artist renowned for her scientific eye and precise detail. The engravings of roses, lilies, carnations, and other plants, as well as butterflies and insects, will be of use to graphic artists, craftspeople, students, and historians.
Merian's Antique Botanical Prints (Dover Electronic Clip Art) (CD-ROM and Book)
Amazon Price: $60.59 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $16.95
Used Price: $18.08
Paperback: 48 pages
Publisher: Dover Publications (March 8, 2005)
Amazon ratings: 3.4 out of 5 stars (5 customer reviews) | Like (2)
Note: the low ratings are from people who don't know Merian and were surprised to find bugs crawling all over the plants!
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Plate from Erucarum Ortus (1679-1717)
Online galleries of the work of Maria Sibylla Merian
A lot of the online galleries of Merian's work are in German
- WOMEN AND NATURE: Maria Sibylla Merian
- WOMEN & NATURE exhibition 2001
Department of Special Collections, Memorial Library, University of Wisconsin-Madison. Maria Sibylla Merian. Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium. Hamburg: Hoffman und Campe Verlag, 1964. - Galerie Anna Sibylla Merian
- Kupferstiche von Maria Sibylla Merian
- Maria Sibylla Merian - artist portfolio
- Artist Portfolio - Maria Sibylla Merian
- Anna Sibylla Merian "Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium"
- Kupferstiche von Maria Sibylla Merian
- Galerie Anna Sibylla Merian - Neues Blumenbuch
- Kupferstiche von Maria Sibylla Merian
- Maria Sibylla Merian Online
- Maria Sibylla Merian [German Baroque Era Illustrator, 1647-1717] Guide to pictures of works by Maria Sibylla Merian in art museum sites and image archives worldwide.
- British Museum - Maria Sibylla Merian, A Surinam caiman fighting a South American false coral snake, a drawing
- Maria Sibylla Merian, A Surinam caiman fighting a South American false coral snake, a drawing
- Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium Images 1 to 8
- Audubon House Gallery of Natural History, Key West, Florida
The Oppenheimer Kew Gardens Edition
Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium
Merian - Prints to purchase
The British Museum has a selection of good quality prints of Merian's work for sale - from Merian's Drawings of Surinam Insects' - via its online shop.
- British Museum shop online - Curlew Catesby (or Scarlet Ibis), Maria Sibylla Merian
- British Museum shop online
- British Museum shop online - Pineapple, Maria Sibylla Merian
- British Museum shop online
- British Museum shop online - White bird, with red and black crest, a snake in its mouth, Maria Sibylla Merian
- British Museum shop online
- British Museum shop online - Banana Plant, Maria Sibylla Merian
- British Museum shop online
Giclee Poster Prints of art by Maria Sybilla Merian
posters and prints from Amazon
Occasionally you'll find prints or posters of Merian's work being sold on Amazon
Articles and blog posts about Maria Sybilla Meria
- Christies - sale of first edition of MERIAN, Maria Sibylla (1647-1717). Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium.
- MERIAN, Maria Sibylla (1647-1717). Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium.
Sale price realised £145k - BOOKTRYST: The Beautifully Strange Insects of Maria Sibylla Merian
- commentary on recent sale prices of different editions of her books
- Picturing Plants and Flowers: Maria Sibylla Merian: Red jasmine
- image and brief description of her life
- JSTOR: Maria Sybilla Merian: Recovering an eighteenth century legend
- article to purchase or access if approved
- Maria Sibylla Merian and Frida Kahlo | Mindful Drawing
- commentary on studying Merian with a child in Art Study hour
Botanical Artists - Gardens & Herbals
Botanical Artists - Explorers
recording on expeditions and the plants brought back from expeditions
Resources for botanical artists
Making A Mark
Artist and writer Katherine Tyrrell draws and writes about art for artists and art lovers
Topics include: drawing, painting, art blogs, visual artists, art competitions, art exhibitions, art history; art techniques and tips; art business and marketing; the art economy and making a mark with pastels, coloured pencils and pen & ink
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seosmm
Jan 8, 2012 @ 6:34 am | delete
- Really beautiful work. Very nice lens!
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GardenCherub
Jan 4, 2012 @ 10:27 pm | delete
- I LOVE great botanical art, & remained amazed at the vibrant colors that people in ancient times were able to achieve. Beautiful, beautiful work here. I had never heard of her. Thanks so much for sharing.
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Don_McCyclist
Dec 10, 2011 @ 5:47 pm | delete
- I first learned about Maria Sibylla Merian through an exhibit at the Ghetty Museum in Los Angeles. I'm amazed by the story and fascinated by the work she left us. Thanks for focusing on it in this lens!
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makingamark
Jan 5, 2012 @ 4:52 am | delete
- You've just explained exactly why I wanted to do this lens. So many people don't appreciate what a truly remarkable woman and great artist Merian was.
Anybody who sees her work never ever forgets her.
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Maria Sibylla Merian: Insects of Surinam
by: Katharina Schmidt-Loske
Maria Sibylla Merian: Insects of Surinam
Amazon Price: $26.00 (as of 02/16/2012)
I own a copy of this book and the scope and quality of the artwork is stunning.
Botanical Art
Other female botanical artists
