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WORLD OF
WONDERS
Lynx rufus (bobcat)
20th century (?); taxidermied animal central Louisiana
courtesy of the Louisiana State University Museum of Natural Science
Pichou / Boeuf Sauvage
1758; engraving
by Antoine-Simon Le Page du Pratz (draftsman)
THNOC 1980.205.22
Antoine-Simon Le Page du Pratz, who resided in Louisiana from 1718 to 1734, was not a scientist—neither by profession nor disposition (he was trained in architecture and engineering). His drawings of animals and plants range from fairly accurate to not-so-accurate, as is evident in this illustration of a bobcat, which contrasts dramatically with a mounted specimen of the animal itself. But Le Page du Pratz wrote with an effusiveness that captures the abundance of life in Louisiana.
"J or as long as Louisiana has existed, its bounty of natural resources has been the subject of a tug-of-war between scientific study and commercial exploitation. The tension between those interests has its roots in the earliest days of France’s claim to the territory. Yet, just as people continue to admire and study the region’s flora and fauna regardless of economic or environmental concerns, many of Louisiana’s early inhabitants were motivated by intellectual curiosity instead of mercenary glee.
“There are two basic forks to the observations and encounters with the natural world that the people [of early Louisiana] had,” says John Lawrence, The Historic New Orleans Collection’s director of museum programs. “There’s this sort of pure joy of discovery of plants and animals that were unknown to them, but then there’s also the question, ‘How can this be put to use?”’
Seeking the Unknown: Natural History Observations in Louisiana, 1698-1840, THNOC’s exhibition opening February 23, will examine early settlers’ and explorers’ various approaches—romantic, scientific, and economic—to Louisiana’s natural world. Presented in conjunction with the 18th
annual Williams Research Center
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Symposium, also titled the Unknown (see accompanying story on p. 8), and cocurated by Gilles-Antoine Langlois, associate professor of architecture at Universite Paris-Est Creteil in France, th'e exhibition features a wide range of natural artifacts, from taxidermied animals and specimens in jars to pressed plants and lavishly illustrated folios.
The idea for the exhibition originally came about during the run-up to the state bicentennial. “It occurred to me that talking about Louisiana as a hunk of land or a place might be a productive approach to the bicentennial, rather than focus on the usual political or cultural narratives,” Lawrence recalls. “It opens a window onto some lesser-known
2 Volume XXX, Number 1 —Winter 2013