Booklist
How do we know what dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals looked like? We depend on paleoart--paintings and sculptures created by artists who use fossils and the speculations of scientists to reconstruct and restore long-lost life-forms. The entertaining history of this invaluable, tremendously popular, and ever-changing genre is the subject of this unprecedented volume by Allen Debus, editor of Dinosaur World, and his coauthor and wife, Diane. Their lively study features a wealth of illustrations (alas, only in black-and-white), some rare, some ravishing, others hilarious. As the Debuses track the simultaneous evolution of scientific discoveries and corresponding paleoart aesthetics, they discuss such milestones as the paleo-fantasies of British artist John Martin (1789-1854), whose romantic scenic restorations tend toward the cataclysmic, and the evocative panoramas of Charles R. Knight, the most popular of American paleoartists and a master at maintaining "theoretical correctness" while evoking tremendous drama. The need to balance imagination with scientific exactitude is the genre's great challenge, whether the artist is working with paint, sculpting media, or the latest in cyber-imagining, and paleoimagery succeeds to the degree that it simultaneously educates and delights, goals felicitously achieved here. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Book Description
Other than seeing them in popular movies such as Jurassic Park, how do people today know what dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals looked like? Only their fossils remain, but thanks to paleoartists most people have a good idea of what these creatures looked like.
The world of paleoart and its artists are the subject of this richly illustrated work. It explores themes in the depiction of dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals, paleoart’s history and speculative nature and its effect on scientists’ impressions of prehistoric animals. Also explored are such topics as the careers of several paleoartists, including Georges Cuvier, Gideon Mantell, John Martin, Neave Parker, Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins and Charles R. Knight, the depiction of scientific ideas about dinosaurs and prehistoric animals on canvas and in sculpture, the purpose and process of restoring them in museums, the significance of certain restorations and images, and the development of paleoart in America.
