Digital Library: Getty Grant Project
Art Collections in the Academy Library
While the Academy of Natural Sciences is an institution world-renowned for its scientific excellence, it is also a repository for great works of art. The Academy's Library holds an impressive collection of portraits by some of America's most important 19th century portraitists (Charles Willson Peale, Rembrandt Peale, Thomas Sully, and John Neagle, to name a few of the best represented), and also significant works of art on paper by a wide range of other artists known for their skill at combining art and science (from Titian Ramsay Peale to Alexander Stirling Calder).
The Academy was established in 1812 to advance the "diffusion of useful, liberal, human knowledge". As America's leading scientific institution throughout the 19th century, it attracted to its membership and to its broader circle of influence the preeminent scientific figures of the time. The humanities were also well represented in the activities of the Academy. The artist-naturalists Alexander Wilson (1766-1813), John James Audubon (1785-1851), John Gould (1805-1866), Charles Alexandre Lesueur (1778-1846), and Thomas Nuttall (1786-1859), all of whose works can be found at the Academy, were numbered among the institution's distinguished early members.
Other important 19th century art collections in the Academy are represented in the eclectic gathering of engravings by Alexander Lawson (1772-1846). watercolors of talented natural history artists Helen Lawson (1808?-1853) and Lucy Way Sistare Say (1801-1886), Joseph Leidy's (1823-1891) illustrations of fossils and microscopic animals, and the shimmering gold and silver leafed watercolors of hummingbirds by William Lloyd Baily (1828-1861). The 19th century expeditionary scene is also represented with works by Richard H. Kern (1821-1853), his brother Edward Kern (1823-1863), and Samuel Seymour; all three of whose works depict some of the earliest authentic graphic images of the American West.
The Academy's art holdings stretch beyond the nineteenth century. The twentieth century is colorfully represented with the paintings, drawings, and sketchbooks of bird artists T.M. Shortt, Robert M. Mengel, and Robert Verity Clem, and the beautiful botanical illustrations of Hugh E. Stone. Early works include a stunning 17th century album of insect watercolors by Alexander Marshal.
Cataloging and digitizing of the art collections has been made possible by a grant from The Getty Grant Program. All images are digitized in the Alfred M. Greenfield Digital Imaging Center for Collections.
How to Use the Guide
The Guide to Art Collections is an alphabetical listing of the art collections represented by finding aids in the Academy's library. Click on the title to view the finding aid, which will include a detailed description of the collection. Internet Explorer 6.0+ or Netscape 7 is needed in order to view the finding aids, as they are currently only available as XML documents.
Finding aids that include digital images of collection items are indicated in the column labeled "Digitized" with a Y for yes or N for no. Within the finding aid, images are represented as thumbnails. In order to view a larger image, click the thumbnail. Both thumbnails and larger jpegs have been processed for the web at 75 dpi.
While the Academy has digitized and posted a large number of items, this presence on the web does not constitute permission to use or publish them. Please review information regarding our permissions.
For each collection described in the Guide there is a summary description in the Academy's OPAC (online catalog). When looking for a particular artist, subject, or format, it is most helpful to search the OPAC, as some collections contain works by multiple artists (i.e., the Alexander Lawson Scrapbooks also contain artwork by Alexander Wilson, Titian Ramsay Peale, Samuel Seymour, and Helen Lawson), and include multiple subjects and formats. Also, collections consisting of single items of art or a multitude of published items do not have finding aids, and are only available in the OPAC.
Go to the Guide of Art Collections