Ferdinand Bauer (draftsman)

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Brunonia australis R.BR. , Illustration by Ferdinand Bauer

Ferdinand Lucas Bauer (born January 20, 1760 in Feldsberg , Lower Austria , † March 17, 1826 in Hietzing near Vienna ) was an Austrian botanical draftsman. He traveled to Australia with Matthew Flinders' expedition and documented the flora and fauna there. Its official botanical author's abbreviation is " FLBauer ".

Ferdinand Lucas Bauer was a son of the court painter of Prince Franz Joseph I von Liechtenstein , Lucas Bauer, and a brother of the two painters Josef Anton Bauer (1756–1831) and Franz Andreas Bauer (1758–1840). When Ferdinand was three years old, his father died. His first lessons in drawing, as well as in biology, gave him, like his older brother Franz Andreas, the prior of the local monastery, Norbert Boccius (1729-1806). The brothers then studied at the University of Vienna in 1772 with the botanist and graphic artist Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin . There they also learned microscopy, which they also used to draw even more precise and detailed images. At the age of 15 Ferdinand and his brother Franz created a series of botanical miniatures.

In 1786 Ferdinand traveled to the eastern Mediterranean with Professor John Sibthorp from Oxford , where he created around 1,000 colored drawings of plants, 363 of animals and 131 landscapes, based on which the ten-volume, magnificently illustrated work Flora Graeca was created in 1806 . Bauer moved to Oxford to work on collected drawings.

In 1801, thanks to the recommendation of Joseph Banks , he undertook a research trip to Australia as a draftsman with Matthew Flinders. By July 1802 he had created 700 drawings of Australian plants and animals, a year later another 600 pictures were added. On this trip he made a total of 2,073 drawings, mostly of Australian plants. Since he did not have all the colors he needed on the ship in sufficient quantities, he provided many of the sketches with color numbers in order to be able to complete them after the voyage. Since no one could meet Bauer's high standards when completing the works, he had to do the work himself, which took a long time and also meant that he did not publish all of the sketches. Bauer also researched and drew the plants of Norfolk Island , a remote prison island in the Pacific Ocean.

In 1813 Bauer began his work Illustrationes Florae Novae Hollandiae , which however did not bring him financial success. He left Australia and returned to Austria in August 1814. There he continued to work on English-language works until his death in Hietzing.

A cape on the coast of Australia is named Cape Bauer at Flinders' suggestion .

literature

Web links

Commons : Ferdinand Bauer (draftsman)  - album with pictures, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Ferdinand Bauer (draftsman)  - sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Andreas W. Daum: German Naturalists in the Pacific around 1800. Entanglement, Autonomy, and a Transnational Culture of Expertise . In: Hartmut Berghoff, Frank Biess, Ulrike Strasser (ed.): Exploration and entanglements: Germans in Pacific Worlds from the Early Modern Period to World War I . Berghahn Books, New York 2019, pp. 82 .
  2. ↑ Mosaik 445, p. 30
personal data
SURNAME Bauer, Ferdinand
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Bauer, Ferdinand Lucas (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian botanical draftsman
DATE OF BIRTH January 20, 1760
PLACE OF BIRTH Feldsberg , Lower Austria
DATE OF DEATH March 17, 1826
Place of death Hietzing near Vienna