DESCOURTILZ LITHOGRAPHS FROM PAGEANTRY OF AMERICAN BIRDS

Stunning Brazilian Birds, represented with their preferred food sources.

These beautiful folio-sized prints, originally from Oiseaux brilliants et remarquables du Bresil by Jean Theodore Descourtilz, one of the rarest and most beautiful hand-colored bird books ever produced, has been taken from an out-of-print limited edition published in Amsterdam.  This fine reproduction print on heavy quality rag paper with no text in back was produced using full-color offset printing, the result being stunning color and detail.  In their preface, the editors of the volume state that “the utmost care has been taken to achieve a flawless reproduction”. 

Jean-Théodore Descourtilz was one of the eight sons of the French adventurer/ naturalist Michel Etienne Descourtilz. and supplied the illustrations to the latter's Flore médicale des Antilles, published in Paris between 1821 and 1829. Jean-Théodore prepared and published Oiseaux brillans du Brésil in Paris in 1834. An English edition with the same illustrations, printed by Waterlow & Sons appeared in 1856.

Descourtilz worked for the National Museum of Rio de Janeiro. He died on 13th January 1855 at Riacho in Brazil. A commemorative facsimile of the work was published in Portuguese by Livraria Kosmos Editôra in 1944 with notes by João Moojen.

Original text in French (followed by English translation)