| European Watercolors Gallery |
| Aert Schouman | |||
| Aert Schouman was a prolific artist who specialized in flower painting and engraving on glass, but was foremost in the art of natural history painting. After training with F. Greenwood and Adriaen van den Burg, he became a master painter at The Hague in 1748, and three years later regent of the art academy. By 1762 he had been appointed principal of the academy and included among his pupils was the great Dutch flower painter Jan van Os. Schouman was fortunate to receive royal patronage and completed many works for Prince Willem V at the summer palace of Het Loo, at Apeldoorn. The Prince owned a zoological cabinet and a menagerie which contained mammals, snakes and birds from various parts of the world. Although newly arrived exotic birds were popularly depicted, the favorite bird subjects in the eighteenth century were still live domestic poultry, followed by dead partridges and other species. Among the domestic birds, new breeds were being developed and pyle, hamburg and bantam cocks began to appear. Hens with their chickens were very popular, although the young of most every other species (with the exception of ducklings and goslings) were ignored. Between 1765 and 1768, Schouman was employed in the pictorial recording of the animals at Willem V’s palace at Het Loo. Over one hundred drawings by him can be found in one of the few surviving complete recueils, the Vogel Broeck (or Bird Book). Moreover, Schouman's depictions of the animals housed in the royal menagerie, along with those of Simon Fokke, formed the core of thirty-four treatises on foreign animals, published between 1767 and 1787 by Arnout Vosmaer. Their illustrations were accompanied by descriptions written by Peter Simon Pallas. In this watercolor of a beaver in his natural environs, Schouman displays his skill pectacularly forging a remarkable synthesis between a concern for scientific truth and the decorative and exotic aspects of natural history that were highly prized by royal and private clients. In this composition, the beaver provides a strikingly accurate impression of Schouman’s veracity in scale and his understanding of artistic composition. This is one of the masters of natural history’s best paintings and is a valuable record showing the eighteenth-century synthesis of science and the aesthetic. | |||
| Edition: from Vogel Broeck, 1767-1787, published by Arnout Vosmaer Medium: Watercolor within gray ink framing lines | |||
| SELECTIONS FROM THIS WORK | |||
 Aert Schouman - A Beaver by a River details |  Aert Schouman - A Cayenne Jay details |  Aert Schouman - A Crested Oropendula details |  Aert Schouman - A Crownbird at the Foot of a Tree, a Terrace in the Background details |  Aert Schouman - A Flying Squirrel details |  Aert Schouman - A Merganser Standing on Rocks with Another Bird details |  Aert Schouman - A Purple Heron on a Sand Bank details |  Aert Schouman - A Red-winged Starling with Another Bird details |  Aert Schouman - A Resting Cow, 1765 details |  Aert Schouman - A Skimmer and a Dove on the Sea Shore details |  Aert Schouman - A Sparrowhawk on a Branch, looking left, 1775 details |  Aert Schouman - An Adult and Juvenile Night Heron details |  Aert Schouman - An Agouti details |  Aert Schouman - An Alpine Cough on a Branch details |  Aert Schouman - An Anteater details |  Aert Schouman - An Egyptian Goose on the Shore details |  Aert Schouman - Sleeping Dog details |  Aert Schouman - Three Birds in a Tree: A Weaverbird, a Redbilled Quelea and a Red Bishop details |  Aert Schouman - Turkeys, Chicken and a Guinea Fowl by a Wooden Fence details |  Aert Schouman - Two Long-Tailed Tits and a Bunting, 1770 details |
