Pancrace Bessa et al. | An album of botanical drawings by Bessa et al. from the collection of the Duchesse de Berry

Pancrace Bessa and others

An album of 33 original watercolour drawings of flowers and plants by Pancrace Bessa, Ferdinand Bauer, Lucy Anderson Pelham, and others unsigned or unattributed, together with a small quantity of miscellaneous prints bound towards the end, oblong folio (323 x 480mm.), contemporary green morocco gilt by Simier (signed and with his ticket) with the crowned monogram of the Duchesse de Berry (Olivier 2554 fer 6), gilt edges, housed in a contemporary green fitted case with her arms

FROM THE COLLECTION OF THE DUCHESSE DE BERRY, A FINELY-BOUND ALBUM OF WATERCOLOUR DRAWINGS INCLUDING 11 ON VELLUM BY PANCRACE BESSA, 4 of which are of humming-birds. Bessa was one of the foremost botanical artists of his day, a pupil of Gerard van Spaendonck and a contemporary of Redouté. He was the Duchesse de Berry’s painting tutor.

The album also contains three signed drawings by Austrian artist Ferdinand Bauer, and several others not signed but identifiably in the same hand. Bauer famously travelled with Matthew Flinders on his expedition to Australia.

PROVENANCE:

A note loosely inserted by a previous owner suggests that the album was presented to the Duchesse de Berry by the Principe de Polignac (probably Jules de Polignac), and that the Duchesse later gave it to Georgiana Heneage, the aunt of the note’s author