Long before Darwin's voyages of discovery, a 52-year-old woman traveled alone with her daughter to Suriname to beautifully portray the metamorphosis of insects. The German Maria Sibylla Merian showed what hardly anyone had seen before. Kennislink did a 'fictional interview' with the silent but very talented adventurer and artist.
Maria Sibylla Merian (1647 – 1717) saw such beautiful insects from the Indies in the curiosities of wealthy Amsterdammers that she decided to travel to the tropics herself. The 52-year-old nature lover and artist traveled to Suriname with her youngest daughter.
Two years later she returned to Amsterdam and elaborated her numerous notes into what is considered an international masterpiece and referred to by many scholars such as Carolus Linnaeus; Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium, or The Change of Surinamese Insects.
Where does your interest in painting insects and other nature come from?
My father, the well-known engraver and publisher Matthäus Merian the Elder, died when I was only three years old. My mother then remarried to Jacob Marrell, pupil of the artist Georg Flegel. Marell mainly painted flower arrangements and still lifes. From a very young age he took me to his studio near us in Frankfurt and taught me everything about painting, from preparing pigments to engraving copper plates and printing. He did this secretly, because my mother thought that I should develop into a neat and household-oriented young lady and painting was not for women. In his studio he collected many flowers, plants, exotic fruits and all kinds of carefully prepared small animals, including insects. My mother thought that was horrible, she called them 'creepy creatures'!
Is that why you chose to study insects so well?
That could very well be, but I also just found them very interesting. From a young age I was interested in the enormous diversity of insects. Early on I experimented with silkworms. But when I saw that even more beautiful butterflies emerged from it, I decided to collect all the caterpillars I could find so that I could observe their changes and paint.
I prepared the caterpillars with brandy and lavender oil. Butterflies I quickly killed with a glowing needle. I prepared the dyes from plants so that I could portray everything in just the right color.
I worked very hard and according to my stepfather I also had real talent. But I wanted more than painting, I also wanted to know everything about the insects and plants I drew. That is why I took Latin lessons so that I could read the works of great naturalists.
That led to your book Der raupen wunderbare Verwandelung und sonderbare Blumenahrung. in 1679. How was the response?
Well, surprisingly good, I can tell you. I thought it was exciting, because there weren't many women who entered the men's world of science and I also had no education.
But even from the circles of the brightest European naturalists I received letters of the highest praise. I think that was because the metamorphosis of insects had never been portrayed before and because of the precision with which I made my drawings. As I became more famous, I was also increasingly sent insect larvae. I also continued to collect myself. I followed the development of the larvae closely, I kept them in small boxes on the leaves of the plants I found them on and fed them. And of course I made drawings and notes of every phase.
Despite your success, you made a remarkable decision in 1685. Can you tell us more about that?
Well, after the divorce from my husband I didn't know anymore. My mother wanted to go to the Netherlands because my stepfather had always traded there and I decided to go with her and my two daughters. Near Leeuwarden, we joined the strict labadist community in Waltha-State Castle. We were to submit completely to the authority of the spiritual leaders and to abandon our original work. So I was no longer allowed to paint. There I heard stories about Suriname for the first time, because a relative of the owners of the castle was governor of Suriname.
Yet you first moved to Amsterdam. How was that time?
When the community fell apart due to quarrels, I moved with my two daughters to Amsterdam in 1691, my mother had died in the meantime. Many people there knew my earlier work and that is how I came into contact with wealthy, prominent Amsterdammers, many of whom had cabinets of curiosities in their beautiful canal houses. It contained all kinds of exotic plants, herbs, rocks, butterflies and stuffed animals from the West and East Indies. The insects in particular were really beautiful! I also became friends with Caspar Commelin, the director of the Amsterdam Hortus Botanicus. He taught me a lot about plants and flowers.
How did you manage to go to Suriname? That was a remarkable journey for a woman alone…
I saw so many wonderful insects from the tropics in Amsterdam that I wanted to go there myself to see them alive. I had already heard about Suriname in the community, so that appealed to me. In February 1699 I placed an advertisement in the Amsterdamsche Courant in which I offered all my work for sale. In June I had enough money together to make the crossing. I then traveled to the Dutch colony with my youngest daughter. Fortunately, the weather was good and we were there after a month.
How was the transition from neat Amsterdam to wild Suriname?
That took some getting used to! For 21 months we lived in a religious community. The Dutch there occasionally treated the 'Indians' and 'savages' terribly. I involved them in my work. In the jungle they looked for small animals for me and they took them, including the plants they grew on. Our house was full of breeding tanks, terrariums and aquariums. It was terribly hot, but I kept busy. I studied all the flora and fauna and painted everything as detailed as possible. It was manageable, except when the cockroaches penetrated through cracks and locks in suitcases and closets. And a swarm of wasps once settled in my painting case. I also sometimes got infections from poisonous caterpillars and eventually I contracted malaria, you must have heard that.
Yes, that was also the reason you went back to Amsterdam, right? Fortunately, otherwise your masterpiece might never have come to fruition!
Well, masterpiece? Do you see it that way? I was indeed forced by the malaria to return to Amsterdam and there I immediately started working out the thousands of notes and sketches I had made in Suriname. Caspar Commelin helped me with the scientific names of the plants. I had the engraving in copper done by master cutters and I colored all the drawings together with my daughters. In 1705 my book was Metamorphosis Insectorum surinamensium finished. A Dutch and a Latin version appeared, the total circulation was sixty. People from all over Europe traveled to Amsterdam for it! Little was known about the tropics, few trips were made and entomology was still an unexplored area. Commercially the book was not such a success, I had put more money into it than I got for it. So in recent years I have lived in poverty with my youngest daughter, but today the Russian Tsar Peter the Great bought almost all my works for three thousand guilders!
That's nothing compared to what the contemporary American collector Graham Arader asks for your books. He estimates the value of your first book at USD 250,000 and that of your book about the metamorphosis of the Surinamese insects at USD 450,000!
Is that real? What an amazing amount of money that is, I really can't imagine anything with that.