print room: Rex Brasher Rex Brasher (1869-1960) was a Connecticut wildlife artist who in the early 1930s produced a limited edition set of books entitled The Birds and Trees of North America. The work was comprised of 874 prints (either collotypes or, in later volumes, offset lithographs) of Brasher's original paintings, painted from 1895 to 1828 and covering 1200 species and subspecies of North American birds. Unable to afford color printing, Brasher is credited with having done all of the handcoloring (using airbrush and stencil) of the bird figures in the black-and-white prints. Assistants helped color less important elements including background and sky. Although Brasher originally hoped to complete 500 copies of the work (reflected in the limitation that appeared on the title page of each volume), he soon realized this would not be feasible given the time required. He therefore reduced the edition size to 100 copies. The prints offered here are from a complete copy of the third volume of the work (covering ducks, geese, swans, flamingo, spoonbill, ibises and herons). The volume is signed by Brasher on the title page, but is not numbered. This is consistent with title pages of volumes seen in the collection of the Library of Congress. The volume is complete with text and 80 plates -- 77 plates illustrating the covered species and sub-species, plus three decorative bonus plates. The plates measure around 16 inches x 12 inches (not including the binding edge which is approximately 1-1/4 inches).
The prints are very clean, well colored, and in overall excellent condition with light toning along the edges. Numbers shown are the American Ornithologists' Union (AOU) numbers.
Last updated 07.10.10 |
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