Blue Passion Flower & Moth

This beautiful, originally hand-colored engraving is from Pierre Joseph Buchoz’s Collection Précieuse et Enluminée des fleurs les plus Belles et les plus Curieuses, qui se cultivent tant dans les jardins de la Chine que dans ceux de l’Europe or Precious and Illuminated Collection of the Most Beautiful and the Most Peculiar Flowers Cultivated in the Gardens of China and in Those of Europe. The work was published in Paris between 1776 and 1779 by Debure l’aîné et chez l’Auteur.

The flowers were often presented with insects, butterflies, or birds. The engravings illustrated plants of China and Europe.

Pierre-Joseph Buchoz (1731-1807) was a French physician, lawyer, and naturalist. He was highly interested in Chinese culture and followed after Voltaire introducing ‘Chinoiserie’ to the European audience. He was the first to produce a botanical work following this tradition. The engravings “have the decorative qualities which we have always associated with Far Eastern art.” (Blunt and Stearn)

The beautiful images in the work were drawn from flowers cultivated in gardens in China and Europe in the 18th century. Buchoz’s engravings are easily recognized by their strong detail and their visually appealing balanced composition. As stated by art historian Michael Sullivan, these engravings are “remarkable from the technical point of view” for the way in which “the engraver has not merely transmitted the line… but has managed to suggest, with the burin, the tone of Chinese watercolour. Only when we look carefully at these pictures do we realize that they are engraved and not drawn with the brush.”