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Sydney Parkinson - Resources for Botanical Art Lovers

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Sydney Parkinson (1745 - 1771) - the artist on the Endeavour

Sydney Parkinson was one of the botanical artists on Captain Cook's journey's on the Endeavour. He was the first botanical artist to draw and paint plants collected on the exploratory voyages and he was the first artist to set foot on Australian soil, to draw an authentic Australian landscape, and to portray Aboriginals from direct observation.

This site provides links to places online where you can find out more about Parkinson, the voyages with the Endeavour and what happened to the drawings and paintings when he returned to the UK

There is very little information about Parkinson online or in books and this site continues to be a work in progress. Please leave tips about useful sites to include as a comment.

Note: All images sourced from Wikipedia/Wikimedia Commons

You can find out about...

Sydney Parkinson - an overview

Sydney Parkinson was born in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1745. He studied drawing and became proficient at drawing plants and flowers. He decided to move to London to improve his education and experience. There he was discovered by a young Joseph Banks who subsequently hired him to work at the botanical garden at Kew.

The next year he was hired by Banks to draw the plants collected.on the voyages by Captain Cook to South America, Tahiti, New Zealand and Australia.

He lived and worked on board ship (not a level surface!) in a small cabin surrounded by hundreds of specimens. In Tahiti he was plagued by swarms of flies which ate the paint as he worked.

On the return trip the ship Endeavour was besieged by illness and Sydney Parkinson contracted dysentary at Princes Island, on the way to Cape Town. He died on January 26th 1771 and was buried at sea. Banks paid his outstanding salary to his brother.

Parkinson had completed 280 finished and botanically accurate paintings and over 900 sketches and drawings.

Parkinson is commemorated through naming a plant and a bird. Ficus parkinsonii was named in his honour as was the common and scientific name of the Parkinson's Petrel Procellaria parkinsoni.

After very many years, Sydney Parkinson is finally getting recognition for the valuable work he performed on such an important voyage of discovery. His works have been commemorated in the 35 volumes of a published Florilegium (Banks Florilegium) and has also been digitised by the Natural History Museum (see below for more about these)

Bibliography - see below

Biography of Sydney Parkinson

Bibliography:
* Rex Rienits, 'Parkinson, Sydney (1745? - 1771)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 2, Melbourne University Press, 1967, p. 314.
* Britten, J. (ed.), Illustrations of Australian Plants Collected in 1770 during Captain Cook's Voyage, London, 1905. [detail]
* Rienits, R.; Rienits, T., Early Artists of Australia, Sydney, 1963. [detail]
* Smith, B., European Vision and the South Pacific, 1768-1850, Oxford, 1960. [detail]
* J.H.Maiden Sir Joseph Banks: the Father of Australia (1909);
M.Rix The Art of the Plant World (1981);
* D.J.Carr Sydney Parkinson: Artist of Cookís Endeavour Voyage (1983);
* J.Phipps Artist's Gardens (c.1986);
* L.deBray The Art of Botanical Illustration (1989);
* J.Kerr The Dictionary of Australian Artists (1992);
* W.Blunt & W.T.Stearn The Art of Botanical Illustration 2nd edn (1994);
* C.Mills Images from Nature (1998);
* T.Rice Voyages of Discovery (1999);
* H.Hewson Australia - 300 Years of Botanical Illustration (1999)

Rocky Road: Sydney Parkinson: When the 25-year-old Joseph Banks boarded the Endeavour with James Cook, he brought with him, among others, two artists. Much could go wrong on 18th-century ship voyages, and much did on the Endeavour. One of Banks's artists, Alexander Buchan, died shortly after the ship reached Tahiti. That left the other artist, Sydney Parkinson, to illustrate all the specimens Banks collected, with only a little help from Banks's secretary. Tropical temperatures and a rocking ship added to Parkinson's challenges as he tried desperately to keep up with the collections of plants, marine and terrestrial animals, and sea birds. According to some accounts, bugs ate pigments off the paper as Parkinson tried to paint what he saw.
Sydney Parkinson - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Sydney Parkinson (c. 1745 - 26 January 1771) was a Scottish Quaker, botanical illustrator and natural history artist.
Sydney Parkinson (c.1745-1771) - PlantExplorers.com™: Parkinson, Sydney c.1745-1771, Botanical artist
Parkinson, Sydney (1745? - 1771) Biographical Entry - Australian Dictionary of Biography Online: Parkinson, Sydney (1745? - 1771) - Parkinson was the first artist to set foot on Australian soil, to draw an authentic Australian landscape, and to portray Aboriginals from direct observation.
Council of Heads of Australasian Herbaria - Parkinson, Sydney: Council of Heads of Australasian Herbaria
Australian National Herbarium
BIOGRAPHY
Wooden Tall Ships - Sydney Parkinson artist on the Endeavour: Sydney Parkinson was a very versatile artist who had to draw everything from landscapes to birds, mammals, fish, insects. And on board ship too, with the ship rolling around all over the place.
Dictionary of Australian Artists Online (DAAO) - Sydney Parkinson: Parkinson was indefatigable. Apart from the many drawings of coastal views, natives and landscapes made on the Endeavour's voyage, now held in the British Museum (Department of Manuscripts), he made 955 drawings of flora - 675 sketches and 280 finished drawings - and 377 drawings of fauna. The latter are housed in the British Museum (Natural History), London.
National Museum of Australia - Sydney Parkinson's account: European voyages to the Australian continent
EMPIRE Endeavour artist Sydney Parkinson's Journal Account, published 1773

The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations

Sydney Parkinson sailed on the Endeavour and made the first sketches of the plants which were encountered and collected.

The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum: An image gallery of botanical art from the first voyage of the Enveavour.
The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum - Introduction & The Voyage: The Botany Library at the Natural History Museum holds all of the surviving botanical artwork from Captain James Cook's first Pacific voyage on the Endeavour. Represented are works of the artists Sydney Parkinson (1745-1771), John Frederick Miller and Frederick Polydore Nodder, among others. These artists' works feature in the finished watercolours made during and after the voyage, between 1773 and 1784.
The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum - The Collections: Parkinson's sketches finally made up 21 large bound volumes.

Description of the scale and the enormity of the task facing Sydney Parkinson
The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum - Publication and Printing from Copper Plates: Banks employed five watercolourists from the winter of 1773 to complete 595 new artworks based on Parkinson's unfinished work. He then also employed 18 engravers until 1784, to cut copper printing plates, based on 743 artworks, in readiness for scientific publication in colour.
The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum - Final Publication: It was not until the 1980s that the Museum, in association with the publisher Editions Alecto, decided to renovate the copper printing plates which were still in safe storage and then to print from them, for the first time in colour, the complete set of images.
The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum - People: Short bios of Cook Banks solander and Parkinson
Illustrations Pictures from Cook's first voyage: 43 illustrations from the Natural History Museum Picture Library
Sydney Parkinson, artist of Cook's Endeavour voyage / D.J. Carr, editor | National Library of Australia: Available in the National Library of Australia collection. Format: Book; xv, 300 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 25 x 25 cm.
Sydney Parkinson - Botanical drawings: Sydney Parkinson - Botanical drawings

Botanical Illustrations by Sydney Parkinson

All the Endeavour Botanical Illustrations completed after Tahiti were done by Sydney Parkinson as he became the sole artist on the voyage after the death of the other artists Alexander Buchan in Tahiti.

Sydney Parkinson - Wikimedia Commons: Sydney Parkinson From Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository
File:Banksia serrata watercolour from Bank's Florilegium.jpg - Wikimedia Commons: Banksia serrata watercolour from Bank's Florilegium.jpg From Wikimedia Commons,
File:Banksia integrifolia watercolour from Banks' Florilegium.jpg - Wikimedia Commons: Banksia integrifolia watercolour from Banks' Florilegium.jpg From Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository
Australia - The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum: The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations relating to Australia
Brazil - The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum: The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations relating to Brazil
Java - The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum: The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations relating to Java
Madeira - The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum: The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations relating to Madeira
New Zealand - The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum: The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations relating to New Zealand
Society Islands - The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum: The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations relating to the Society Islands
Tierra Del Fuego - The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations at the Natural History Museum: The Endeavour Botanical Illustrations relating to Tierra del Fuego
Bridgeman - art history and cultural images - Sydney Parkinson: 9 images for artist:sydney parkinson

Parkinson's Drawings of New Zealand

Sydney Parkinson produced many drawings of the natives of New Zealand with tattoos. Sydney Parkinson's drawings can now be seen at the British Museum London, England.

New Zealand Parliament - Parliamentary Library - A New Zealand warrior: Parliamentary Library
Sydney Parkinson, draughtsman to Sir Joseph Banks, sailed on Cook's first voyage on the Endeavour 1768-71, and completed many hundreds of drawings on the voyage. NZ warrior, Sydney Parkinson, Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, London, 1784

Banks' Florilegium

with drawings and paintings by Sydney Parkinson

Banks' Florilegium takes its name from Joseph Banks. It comprises consists 743 botanical line engravings, which were created based on the watercolour paintings and drawings from nature made by Sydney Parkinson on his journey with Banks and Daniel Solander on Captain James Cook's first voyage round the world, 1768-1771.

Banks employed Sydney Parkinson to travel with him on the voyage and make drawings of the plants and animals collected by Banks and on the voyage. Parkinson created nearly a thousand drawings and painted studies while working in difficult conditions. The artwork is the expedition record of the plants collected by Sir Joseph Banks and Dr Daniel Carl Solander in Madeira, Brazil, Tierra del Fuego, the Society Islands, New Zealand, Australia and Java. They make sense of the dried specimens collected and also returned to the UK.

Between 1771 and 1784 Banks hired 18 engravers to create the copperplate line engravings from the 743 completed watercolors at a considerable cost of £7,000. The Florilegium was not printed in Banks' lifetime and he bequeathed the plates to the British Museum.

All but a few of the 743 copperplate engravings have survived to the present day, despite air-raid damage to the British Museum in September 1940.

The great Florilegium of his work was finally published in 1988 by Alecto Historical Editions in 35 volumes and 100 editions. Alecto Historical Editions used the "à la poupée" technique of colour printing from copper plates.

The engravings have also been digitized and published online by the Natural History Museum in London.

Banks Florilegium - Home Page: Alecto Historical Editions published Banks Florilegium in
association with the British Museum (Natural History). This monumental work depicts the plants
collected by Banks and Solander on Captain James Cook's first circumnatigation of the world.
Te Papa - Museum of New Zealand | Topic: Banks' Florilegium: Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa
Daniel Solander wrote a manuscript describing all the species collected from New Zealand during the six months the expedition spent here. It was called Primitiae Florae Novae Zelandiae ('beginnings of a New Zealand flora'), and was to be illustrated with the plates prepared by Banks. It was never published, but it was available for study by anyone interested, first at Banks' London home, then at the Natural History section of the British Museum.

The collection of engraved plates was also held there. Several sets of black and white proofs were made from the plates in the late nineteenth century, and three of these sets were acquired by the Dominion Museum in 1921. In the 1980s, an independent publisher, Alecto Historical Editions, joined with what is now called the Natural History Museum to print 110 sets of all 738 illustrations in full colour.

There are 183 prints in the New Zealand plants section. Te Papa purchased forty-five of these in 1996, and in 2011 bought a full set of the 183 New Zealand colour prints with the assistance of the Friends of Te Papa.
Banks' Florilegium | NZETC: EARLY NEW ZEALAND BOTANICAL ART - BANKS' FLORILEGIUM
All but a few of the 743 copperplate engravings have survived to the present day, despite air-raid damage to the British Museum in September 1940.
Filoli Museum - The Banks' Florilegium: The Filoli Museum has a copy of the Banks Florilegium.

Sydney Parkinson's Journal

the frontispiece and selected links

A JOURNAL OF A VOYAGE TO THE SOUTH SEAS, I N HIS Majesty's Ship, The ENDEAVOUR.

Faithfully transcribed from the Papers of the late SYDNEY PARKINSON,
Draughtsman to JOSEPH BANKS, Esq. on his late Expedition.with Dr. SOLANDER, round the World.
EMBELLISHED WITHViews and Designs, delineated by the AUTHOR, and engraved by capital Artists.
LONDON:
Printed for STANFIELD PARKINSON, the EDITOR:
And sold by Messrs RICHARDSON and URQUHART, at the ROYAL-EXCHANGE; EVANS, in PATER-NOSTER Row ; HOOPER, on LUDGATE-HILL ; MURRAY, in FLEET-STREET; LEACROFT, at CHARING-CROSS; and RILEY, in CURZON-STREET, MAY-FAIR.
M.DCC.LXXIII.

Parkinson's Journal, Title Page: Page i - Parkinson's Journal Title Page
Parkinson's Journal, About this Edition: Page ii - Parkinson's Journal - about this edition
Parkinson's Journal, Table of Contents: Page iii Parkinson's Journal Table of Contents
Parkinson's Journal, Engravings: Page iv Parkinson's Journal List of Engravings
(these relate to drawings of the indigenous people)
A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, in His Majesty's Ship, the Endeavour/Description of Terra del Fuego - Wikisource: A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas, in His Majesty's Ship, the Endeavour by Sydney Parkinson
From Wikisource

View of a Village in the Bay of Good Success, in the Island of Terra del Fuego

engraving after a study by Sydney Parkinson

By Sydney Parkinson [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

BOOKS: About the voyage of the Endeavour

books on Amazon

Botanical Artists - Gardens and Herbals

great botanical artists who documented plants in great gardens

Botanical Artists - Exploration and Discovery

great botanical artists who explored and documented flora from expeditions

See also Ferdinand Bauer in the Bauer Bros. site above

Resources for Botanical Artists

focusing on the history of botanical art and current practice

Making A Mark

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SaintFrantic Oct 7, 2011 @ 5:11 pm | delete

Really great lens.Thanks for put the effort to do it for the rest of us to see

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