AN EXTREMELY RARE AUSTRALIAN VICTORIAN DISPLAY CABINET WITH BIRDS OF PARADISE BY JANE CATHERINE WARD (1817-1889)

Sydney, circa 1880/90

With perched on a branch a king bird-of-paradise (Cicinnurus regius), lesser bird-of-paradise (Paradisaea minor), paradise riflebird (Ptiloris paradiseus), twelve-wired bird of paradise (Seleucidis melanoleucus).

 

H. 73 × W. 54 × D. 46 cm
 

Provenance:
Private collection, the Netherlands (Dutch East-Indies)

Literature:
Martha Sear: Curious and Peculiar? Women Taxidermists in Colonial Australia In: Joan Kerr and Jo Holder (ed.): Past Present. The National Women's Art Anthology. Sydney, 1999, p. 85–99
Rose Docker: The queerest shop in Australia. In: Explore. Australian Museum magazine, vol. 34 (2012), no. 2, p. 3f.

We would like to thank Martha Sear, National Museum of Australia, Sydney, for kindly providing additional information.
 

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Zebregs&Röell highly values the natural world, and therefore only trades in antique specimens or animals that died of natural cause. We hope that these might spark a bit of love for the natural world. We value the pieces that are already there, hunted and made in a time the human race thought mother nature was inexhaustible, we are against hunting for pleasure or for new taxidermy.

 

Please note that all our pieces come with a 'pre-1947 statement' - although purchase is at your own risk, we are glad to be of service with obtaining CITES documents, although purchasing is at your own responsibility.