Plate 44: Mantis, Mayfly, and a Fictional Locust c. 1575 - 1580

Joris Hoefnagel made this watercolor and gouache on paper of insects in the late 16th century. It's a study of insects, typical of the Northern Renaissance when naturalism was combined with symbolic meaning. Hoefnagel worked at a time when the authority of the printed image grew, enabling new fields of scientific and geographic study. The artist's mastery of detail is displayed alongside a kind of playful imagination in the ‘fictional locust’ at the top, raising questions about the boundaries of the natural world. The image can be found in a book; it is plate 44. It's important to remember that the book as a whole was also a social object, displayed in libraries and shown to visiting scholars. It's through understanding these institutional contexts that we can better grasp the public role of early scientific imagery. By looking at who commissioned and collected these works, and how they were displayed and interpreted, we can understand how art played a key role in shaping our understanding of nature.