An Illustrated Catalog of American Fruits & Nuts

About this book

The United States Department of Agriculture Pomological Watercolor Collection encompasses over 7,500 botanical watercolour paintings of evolving fruit and nut varieties, alongside specimens introduced by USDA plant explorers from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Assembled between 1886 and 1942, the collection's remarkable, botanically accurate watercolours were executed by some 21 professional artists (including nine women). Authored largely before the widespread application of photography, the watercolours were intended to aid accurate identification and examination of fruit varieties for the nation's fruit growers. Documenting the transformation of American pomology, the science of fruit breeding and production, and the horticultural innovations accountable for contemporary fruit cultivation and consumption, the USDA's collection offers fascinating anthropological and horticultural insights concerning the fruits we ecstatically devour, and why.

A colourful examination of the USDA's pomological collection contains a delicious cornucopia of illustrations gathered from the collection. Encompassing fruit-suffused anecdotes and observations drawn from the fields of archaeology and anthropology, horticulture and literature, ancient representation and contemporary visual art, this book offers readers an engaging, biophilic meditation upon the sweetest of all earth's produce.

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Biography

The USDA Pomological Watercolor Collection is a collection of original watercolors, lithographs, and photographs documenting fruit and nut varieties developed by growers, including USDA plant explorers, around the turn of the 20th century. These technically accurate paintings were used to create lithographs illustrating USDA bulletins, yearbooks, and other series distributed to growers and gardeners across America. The artworks were created by approximately twenty-one artists commissioned by the USDA.