The Large Flowering Sensitive Plant. The Temple of Flora. London, 1801. $7,500.00

Robert John Thornton's The Temple of Flora, is the most famous English botanical plate book ever produced. Thornton, trained as a physician, but when he inherited his family's fortune, he decided to leave his mark on the world by creating an ambitious series of botanical publications dedicated to the work of the Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus. Linnaeus had revolutionized the world of science in 1735 by developing an entirely new classification system for plants and animals. The golden age of plant illustration followed his discoveries. Thornton's botanical work was to be a "pictorial celebration" including magnificent images, poetry and verse, of the Linnaean botanical system.

The subjects of the flower paintings and the subsequent engravings were exotic specimens placed in romanticized settings replete with symbolism. Thornton hired the finest aquatint artists, engravers and colorists and opened an art gallery to display the original works. He intended to produce 70 different images but Thornton was not a very successful marketer and the cost of producing the wildly expensive work brought him to the edge of financial ruin. He ended by publishing a series of only 28 undeniably spectacular prints. Each is a distinctive and evocative image  very highly valued by print collectors. Good, crisp impressions with well preserved original coloring, such as this one, are very rare.

28  x 22 inches, overall.
Hand colored aquatint, mezzotint and stipple engraving.
Excellent condition.
Framed to museum specifications.