Biography
Fitch was involved in fabric printing from the age of 17 and took to botanical art after meeting William Jackson Hooker, Regius Professor of Botany, a competent botanical illustrator, and the editor of Curtis's Botanical Magazine. Fitch's first lithograph of Mimulus roseus, appeared in the Botanical Magazine in 1834, and he soon became its sole artist. In 1841 W.J. Hooker became director of Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Fitch moved to London. After 1841 Fitch was the sole artist for all official and unofficial publications issued by Kew; his work was paid for by Hooker personally. It was not unusual for him to work on several different publications simultaneously; he could draw directly onto the lithographic stone to save time. These chromolithographs were based on botanical illustrations provided by Hooker and others, and produced some of his most spectacular results.
Fitch's important works are his illustrations for William Hooker's A century of orchidaceous plants (1851), and for James Bateman's A Monograph of Odontoglossum (1864–74). He also created around 500 plates for Hooker's Icones Plantarum (1836–76) and four lithographic plates for the monograph Victoria Regia. The latter work received critical acclaim in the Athenaeum, "they are accurate, and they are beautiful".
Other works were with George Bentham and for J.D. Hooker's Handbook of the British Flora (1858 and many editions). When Joseph Dalton Hooker returned from his travels in India, Fitch prepared lithographs from Hooker's sketches for his Rhododendrons of Sikkim Himalaya (1849–51) and, from the drawings of Indian artists, for his Illustrations of Himalayan Plants (1855). He also produced the illustrations presented in the younger Hooker's The Botany of the Antarctic Voyage and Flora Tasmaniae 1855-9. A dispute over pay with J. D. Hooker ended Fitch's service to both the Botanical Magazine and Kew in 1877. He was much sought after and remained active as a botanical artist until 1888. Works during this period included Henry John Elwes's Monograph of the Genus Lilium (1877-80). His renown as a botanical illustrator was such that his obituary in Nature stated "... his reputation was so high and so world-wide that it is unnecessary to say much on this point.".
The standard author abbreviation Fitch is used to indicate this individual as the author when citing a botanical name. His nephew, John Nugent Fitch (1840–1927), also produced illustrations for Curtis's Botanical Magazine.
Read more about this topic: Walter Hood Fitch
Famous quotes containing the word biography:
“As we approached the log house,... the projecting ends of the logs lapping over each other irregularly several feet at the corners gave it a very rich and picturesque look, far removed from the meanness of weather-boards. It was a very spacious, low building, about eighty feet long, with many large apartments ... a style of architecture not described by Vitruvius, I suspect, though possibly hinted at in the biography of Orpheus.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Just how difficult it is to write biography can be reckoned by anybody who sits down and considers just how many people know the real truth about his or her love affairs.”
—Rebecca West [Cicily Isabel Fairfield] (1892–1983)
“Had Dr. Johnson written his own life, in conformity with the opinion which he has given, that every man’s life may be best written by himself; had he employed in the preservation of his own history, that clearness of narration and elegance of language in which he has embalmed so many eminent persons, the world would probably have had the most perfect example of biography that was ever exhibited.”
—James Boswell (1740–95)