WARD, Rowland.

£1,650 · Offered by Peter Harrington · No longer available

A Naturalist's Life Study in the Art of Taxidermy. First edition, first impression. Rowland Ward was the Michelangelo of Victorian taxidermy, that most Victorian of art-forms. An innovator who developed many techniques still used today, basing his work on painstaking observation he brought the techniques of naturalistic display to their high point. He was a friend of many of the greatest sportsmen of the period, and his trademark jungle dioramas caused a sensation - one staged at Earl's Court in 1896 drew £10,000 in gate money. This biographical sketch and commentary on his methods was published the year after his death in very limited numbers, uncommon institutionally - just four copies on WorldCat - and commercially.

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