Painting as Exploration: Visualizing Nature in Eighteenth-Century Colonial Science*

^* An earlier version of this essay was presented at the History of Science Society 2002 meeting. I am grateful to Antonio Barrera, Paula De Vos, and the audience for their comments. Susan Deans-Smith, the panel's chair, has provided many helpful suggestions and editorial comments and deserves special thanks.

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Notes

^* An earlier version of this essay was presented at the History of Science Society 2002 meeting. I am grateful to Antonio Barrera, Paula De Vos, and the audience for their comments. Susan Deans-Smith, the panel's chair, has provided many helpful suggestions and editorial comments and deserves special thanks.

¹ Spanish-language studies include Díez Torre et al. (1991); Frías Núñez (1994); González Bueno (1988); Gredilla (1982); Lafuente and Sala Catalá (1992); Lafuente, Elena, and Ortega (1993); Pimentel (1998 2003); Muñoz Garmendia (2003 2004); Nieto Olarte (2000); San Pío Aladrén (2000); Puerto Sarmiento (1988); Sánchez, Puig-Samper, and de la Sota (1987); and Villegas (1992) among others. The only two English-language monographs are Steele (1964) and Engstrand (1981); articles include Cañizares-Esguerra (2003 2005); Gavroglu (1999); Glick (1991); Iliffe (2003); Lafuente and Valverde (2005); Lafuente (2000); Nieto Olarte (1993); and Pratt (1992). Some reasons for this neglect are discussed in Cañizares-Esguerra (2004) and Nieto-Galán (1999).

² See, for instance, Brockway (1979); Clark, Golinski, and Schaffer (1999); Grove (1995); Hankins (1985); Kellman (1998); Laissus (1995); MacLeod and Lewis (1988); McClellan (1992); Petitjean et al. (1992); Miller and Reill (1996); Porter and Teich (1981); and Safier (2004).

³ The early modern term ‘natural history’ encompasses a variety of studies corresponding to present-day disciplines including botany, zoology, entomology, mineralogy, climatology, geography, and physical and biological anthropology. See Jardine, Secord, and Spary (1996).

⁴ I discuss these matters in great detail in chapters 1 and 2 of my dissertation (Bleichmar 2005), where I examine not only Spanish policies and projects but also their enactment in the colonies. Concentrating exclusively on the movement of information and specimens from colonies to metropolis, I argue, would imply missing half the story. Trajectories were not only imperial but also colonial; initiatives originated not only in Madrid but also in places like Bogotá, Lima, and Mexico City. Colonial governors and administrators sponsored investigations of local nature with an enthusiasm that suggests that they had their own reasons to be interested in natural history, beyond their duty to ensure the prompt fulfillment of orders from Madrid. Throughout the colonies, local administrators actively encouraged the exploration of nature, hoping to identify products that would boost the regional economy by securing profitable trade with the metropolis. Distance from Madrid—in space, time, and experiences—granted naturalists considerable autonomy, and favored the development of an independent attitude. As Spanish and Spanish American naturalists became increasingly committed to local projects, the relationships they forged in the New World became stronger than those they maintained across the ocean. The relevance of Madrid to their daily work diminished, their priorities and allegiances shifted, and they subtly and gradually turned away from the distant metropolis to face much more immediate and present concerns. Naturalists working in the colonies became nodes of a truly global network in which center and periphery were far from clear or stable categories.

⁵ Ruiz and Pavón were the only travelers who published a Flora (Ruiz and Pavón 1794 and 1798–1802); see Bleichmar (2005, chap. 5) and González Bueno (1995).

⁶ In addition to the finished anatomies included on plant portraits, there is a working notebook with 156 anatomies produced by Matis in 1809–10 (soon after Mutis’ death). This Cuaderno de florones is kept at the Archivo del Real Jardín Botánico, Madrid (hereafter ARJBM), III, M-174 to M-200 and III, M-481. It is fully reproduced in Flora de la Real Expedición Botánica del Nuevo Reino de Granada, vol. 50, plates 40–91. The archive also holds a notebook of corresponding botanical descriptions: ARJBM III, 4, 7, 1–36.

⁷ Mutis reviews his work in New Granada between 1760 and 1783 in a letter to viceroy Antonio Caballero y Góngora, 27 March 1783 (Mutis 1983a, 1:107–16).

⁸ Roque Gutiérrez had worked for Mutis since 1772, García at least since 1777.

⁹ The first five were Antonio Cortés y Alcocer, Nicolás Cortés y Alcocer, Antonio Barrionuevo, Vicente Sánchez, and Antonio de Silva; the others were Francisco Xavier Cortés y Alcocer, Francisco Escobar y Villarroel, Manuel Roales, Mariano Hinojosa, and Manuel Martínez.

¹⁰ Félix Tello, Manuel José Xironza, Nicolás José Tolosa, José Antonio Zambrano, and Valencia (first name unknown) from Popayán; José Joaquín Pérez, Pedro Advíncula de Almansa, José Camilo Quezada, José Manuel Domínguez, and Francisco Manuel Dávila from Santa Fe.