Rare Book Collection: Printing Techniques for Scientific Illustrations
[MEDIEVAL-SOUNDING MUSIC BEGINS.]
[A book is opened to reveal an illustration of seashells. A page is turned in another book to reveal an illustration of insects. Barbara Rhodes walks to a workbench holding a black and white engraving print.]
BARBARA RHODES: The library collection is a library that’s used almost in it’s entirety.
[The camera pans across shelves from the rare book library.]
RHODES: There aren’t too many things that we put away and don’t let anybody see.
[AMNH 150th anniversary logo unfolds over bookshelf footage followed by the title, “Rare Book Collection: Printing Techniques for Scientific Illustrations. Rhodes speaks in the library conservation space.]
RHODES: I’m Barbara Rhodes, and I’m the conservator for the library.
[Conservation materials are laid on a table alongside a sign reading “artwork below.” Close-up of a sign reading “Conservation in progress! Please do not open book.”]
RHODES: A big part of my work is trying to keep the library collection in useable shape for the researchers.
[Slow tilt up shelves of colorfully bound books.]
RHODES: The books in this collection of illustrations sort of run the gamut…
[Black-and-white woodblock illustration of a bird with an ornate “crown” of feathers on its head. Onscreen text reads “Historiae Animalium Liber III, 1585”.]
RHODES: …from the very earliest…
[Engraving print of two kookaburras in a tree with feathers of brown and shades of blue. Text reads “The Birds of Australia, 1848”.]
RHODES: …to some fairly modern types of illustration processes.
[A page from a woodcut-illustrated book depicts many animals–including birds, fish, and mammals–labelled with their names. The word “Woodcut” animates onscreen. Lower-third text reads “Histoire de la Grande Isle Madagascar, 1661”.]
RHODES: We start out with woodcut, which was done on the end grain of a piece of very fine-grained wood like boxwood.
[Rhodes hold up a piece of wood carved to depict a cat. She demonstrates applying ink to the wood and pressing it down on paper to create a print of the cat.]
RHODES: It actually started as a textile printing method and was adapted by book illustrators.
[Rhodes speaks in the library conservation space.]
RHODES: You could actually get very fine detail with woodcut.
[A series of woodblock prints depicting imaginary creatures appear on screen: A 7-headed hydra, an enormous fish with large fangs attacking a ship, a horse with webbed feet and a long mermaid’s tale, five men carving another huge fish, a giant armored fish with two men in its stomach attacks a ship.]
RHODES: But in the early years of printing, they were relying on the accounts of sailors, and travelers, and probably whatever sketches these people brought back with them. So, in many cases I think they let their fancy go a little bit.
[Rhodes speaks in the library conservation space.]
RHODES: It probably helped to sell the book.
[Rhodes unwraps a copper engraving plate at a workbench. The word “engraving” animates onscreen.]
RHODES: Engraving, which is the next step, that was done on metal plates, usually copper.
[Close-up of the copper engraving plate showing an owl and several other birds inscribed into the metal.]
RHODES: And the lines were inscribed into it or incised…
[Drawing of carving tools. The words “graver” and “burin” animate onscreen.]
RHODES: …with a special tool called a graver or a burin,…
[Rhodes speaks in the library conservation space.]
RHODES: …and the ink would be run over the plate into the lines that were engraved, and then they’d wipe off the excess…
[Rhodes mimics the engraving print-making process by placing paper over the engraved copper plate, and running her hand over it, then lifting up the paper to reveal the print.]
RHODES: …and then they would put a piece of dampened paper on it and run a roller over it with great pressure to bring the ink out of the lines and onto the paper.
[Close up of the original full-color print made from this copper plate, depicting several ornate birds and other small animals. Lower-third text reads “Wilson’s American Ornithology, 1808-1814”.]
RHODES: And you could get incredibly fine detail with this method, so it was very popular for quite a long time.
[A lithograph print depicts a bird of paradise with vibrant red, yellow, and green feathers. The word “lithography” animates onscreen. Lower-third text reads “A Monograph of the Paradiseidae, or Birds of Paradise, 1873”.]
RHODES: And then the next thing to develop was lithography, which was invented at the very end of the 18th century.
[Rhodes runs her hand over a smooth, white block of stone about twice the length of her hand.]
RHODES: This is a piece of lithographic stone, it is a very fine-grain limestone.
[A black and white lithographic print of a humpback whale.]
RHODES: By about the 1820s or so, you start to black-and-white lithographs in books.
[A black and white lithographic print of jellyfish.]
RHODES: And then later in the century they developed a process called chromolithography,…
[The images changes from black-and-white to color. The word “chromolithography” animates onscreen.]
RHODES: …which was printing in color.
[A series of brightly colored chromolithographs cycle onscreen, landing on an illustration of three small birds on a branch with the text “A Monograph of the Paradiseidae, or Birds of Paradise, 1873”.]
RHODES: That involved multiple stones, actually, you had to have one stone for each color you were printing. And later they developed a three-color process, so you only needed three stones plus your black.
[The image of the birds becomes translucent yellow.]
RHODES: There was yellow,…
[The image of the birds becomes translucent light blue (cyan).]
RHODES: …cyan,…
[The image of the birds becomes translucent magenta.]
RHODES: …and magenta.
[The three layers of translucent color overlap, forming the original colored image.]
RHODES: And those mixed together, they will actually, in layers, make up the colors on the actual print.
[An artist paints a watercolor of a green bird, with two bird specimens and reference paintings in front of him.]
RHODES: There are artists who work with the scientists in the museum who have used our collections…
[A preserved blowfish specimen is held next to a historic print of the same kind of blowfish.]
RHODES: …and come and look at the way things have been portrayed.
[The camera pans across many illustrations laid out on a table.]
RHODES: They’re valuable as objects in themselves, but the information they contain is why we really have them.
[Credits role.]
Go behind the scenes in the Museum’s Rare Book Collection, which contains unique and beautiful natural history illustrations from the past 400 years. Conservation Librarian Barbara Rhodes leads a journey through the history of printmaking, and discusses how the evolution of various techniques—from simple woodblock to more complex processes such as lithography—allowed naturalists to create more intricate and vivid imagery.