Animals are the main subject of the first paintings in human history; the prehistoric man draws the animals around him, especially those he hunts to eat on the cave walls of his dwellings.
Since then, man continued to be fascinated by the animals around him, capturing their likeness in paintings and drawings. Animal-themed illustrations serve for documentation, teaching and purely as an art form. Mythology, folklore and several forms of art are awash with representations of animals. Furthermore, animal illustrations frequently decorate written texts from early manuscripts, through the dawn of the printed book, and up to the present day. A special reference should be made to the bestiaries, illustrated medieval “books of animals” containing collections of didactic fables about actual or mythical animals.
The thematic exhibition “Animal Illustrations” brings together images and visual representations that reveal how animals were observed, classified, and depicted in different contexts of knowledge and popular culture from the late nineteenth to the twentieth century.
The largest part of the material originates from the archives of the Teachers’ Training School of Crete (Didaskaleio Kritis) in Heraklion, which housed a rich collection of educational wall charts used in teaching the natural sciences. In accordance with the pedagogical theories of the time, these visual aids were intended to stimulate students’ interest and cultivate their powers of observation. The zoological charts, published by Greek and European publishing houses, were employed in the teaching of Natural History, Agriculture, and Animal Husbandry, and constitute characteristic examples of visual instruction in the first half of the twentieth century.
A second group of items derives from travel literature and includes illustrations of animals that travellers regarded as rare, remarkable, or characteristic of the eastern Mediterranean. These images reflect the ways in which the region’s fauna became an object of observation, description, and representation.
The exhibition concludes with chromolithographic prints from the collections of the Hellenic Literary and Historical Archive (ELIA), documented as ephemera. Depicting both wild and domesticated animals, these prints testify to the dissemination of animal imagery in everyday life and popular visual culture.
Through educational visual aids, travel publications, and ephemeral printed material, the exhibition highlights different aspects of the relationship between humans and the animal world, while illustrating how images contributed to the formation of knowledge and perceptions about animals.
The exhibition contains items from the following institutions:
