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Absolutely Gorgeous!
This is a tall book about 12.5 inches (32 cm tall and 24 cm wide) and contains excellent quality presentations of the botanical prints of the collector Clutius [artist(s)unknown]. So you see on each white page an aged parchment that contains the botanical watercolor. The parchments are set on each page with about a one-inch surrounding border of the white background page. All the parchments are very old so their edges are a bit uneven here and there indicating their age and their true paper-making origin. No machine churned out perfect sheets back then. The watercolors themselves are absolutely exquisite and their skilled presentation by the author makes you feel like you are actually paging through the actual collection. She chose 142 watercolors from the collection of 1,800. The artist(s) may be unknown but their skill would have guaranteed them widespread fame today if they had autographed their works. I am a modest collector of botanical books and I just feel so peaceful and content paging through them. This is my favorite book. Even at Amazon's $45 price tag, which I did not pay, I consider this book worth it. Barely, but still worth it! And I am a real skinflint so I don't say this lightly! If you love botanical books, you will treasure this one.
[Tuesday, June 06, 2006]
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