Botaniska bilder till allmänheten : om utgivningen av Carl Lindmans Bilder ur Nordens flora

Sammanfattning: The aim of this study, ”Botanical pictures for the public: On the publication of Carl Lindman’s Bilder ur Nordens flora”, is to investigate the process of how botanical illustrations are designed and produced and how they reach their readers. The perspective is that of book history. The study is based on a large body of previously unresearched empirical material consisting of originals, printed pictures, and written archival material. By a comprehensive analysis of the publication of the flora, the paratexts, the intertextuality, and the comparative history of the pictures, the different factors that steer the form and content of botanical illustrations, are demonstrated, discussed and analyzed. The study of Carl Lindman’s Bilder ur Nordens flora (1901-05) comprehends the examination of an earlier Swedish flora (Svensk botanik, 1802-43). Neither the period (the first decades of the twentieth century) nor the technological shift (from hand-coloured copperplate to colour lithography) have been the subject of in-depth scholarly research before. The scientifically exact illustrations in Bilder ur Nordens flora were influenced by many different factors: changes in the book market, economic considerations, scientific and educational advancement, pictorial conventions, and the improvement of printing techniques – along with the impact of the different actors. The result was a book of colour-lithographed plates that would be a highly popular and long-lasting product on the Nordic book market. A publication venture of this kind involved a constant balancing act between what was economically feasible and what was botanically acceptable. The overriding importance of the financial aspects of the project, and the direct influence of economic considerations on pictorial design and content, are emphatically shown.