Tulipa Globosa Serotina and Sultan Zambach 24x 32cm nib and watercolor.
I have been painting Basilius Besler´s Herbarium for 15 years. It took him 16 years to complete his
As some of the original copper plates where his prints were engraved were melted at the beginning of the war for making weapons; I have undertaken to copy and colour
He named it: "Eystettensis Garden" and managed to change the current concept of botany.
It is very difficult to find an original and if we find one, it would cost between
Besler was a chemist who loved plants, and maybe that’s why he did not made an old fashioned herbarium like the ones made in the previous centuries which mainly represented culinary herbs difficult to identify.
Apart from representing each plant with many great details he setted thems in a very artistic way; his
They made two versions: one in black and white, cheap for use as a reference book, and a deluxe version without text, printed on quality paper and richly hand-colored.
The deluxe edition was sold for a whopping price of 500 guilders,while simple copies uncoloured, were 35 guilders each.
Besler bought a nice house in a fashionable area of Nuremberg, for the price of 2,500 guilders (equivalent to five colored plates of the
