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Blue-fronted Amazon
Blue-fronted Amazon
Amazona aestiva
Cha. Collins Fect. April 1740
Item
1 watercolour painting ; 56 x 39 cm + 1 leaf
Charles Collins was an Irish painter, known for his portraits of animals and still-lifes. He achieved success in England painting exotic birds, game, dogs and dead game still-lifes. He was the painter for Robert Furber’s ‘Twelve Months of Fruit’ (1732). In 1736 he published in collaboration with John Lee a set of 12 large engravings, coloured by hand, of British birds in landscape and garden settings, entitled Icones avium cum nominibus anglicis. He then came to the attention of Taylor White, who engaged him to paint birds from his and others’ collections until 1743. Collins died in 1744, when he was described as ‘Bird Painter to the Royal Society.’
Drawing of a blue-fronted Amazon from a 18th century speciment [modern geographical distribution: the Neotropics and China].
Manuscript note on front of drawing: Blue-fronted Amazon (Chrysotis astiva) Cha. Collins Fect. April 1740; Astivus Ps. Br. viridis L.S.N.;
Manuscript note on back of drawing: The black billed Green Parrot of Aldrov. W. p. 113
Scientific name: Amazona aestiva
With manuscript text on accompanying leaf.
Transcription of manuscript note on accompanying leaf: Astivus.
27 Ps: Brachyurus Viridis, fronte Caerulea
humeris sanguineis. magnitudine
columbae. L.S.N. p.101
Habitat in America
The Summer Parrot
Translation of manuscript note on accompanying leaf: Astivus
27 Ps: Brachyurus Viridis, [The green summer parrot], with a blue forehead, and blood-red shoulders. It is the size
of a dove. L.S.N. p.101
It lives in America.
The Summer Parrot