Victorian monkey etchings, gardens and pressed flowers
Unsure quite where to start, and thinking about the Victorian domestication of nature, attitudes to animals, pets and also the beginnings of mass image reproduction, I went looking for Victorian etchings of capuchin monkeys! The Biodiversity Hirtage Library has a huge catalogue of old images of nature available for public use, so I spent a long evening looking through its 70-something pages of albums, looking specifically for capuchins… After collecting them in a document, I got them printed and made a quick animation from them… Not sure this worked that well but it was a starting point:
I also found some old illustrations of Victorian garden plans on The Biodiversity Library Flickr account and have been playing around with them too. I might try and create some sort of sculpture of a Victorian Garden. I’ve also been pressing some flowers using an iron(!), as flower pressing was a common hobby in the Victorian era. Still don’t quite know where I’m going with all this but trying not to worry too much and just explore…
