Botanical Gardens (1863)

Tinted lithograph, printed on stone, 26.3 × 36.1 cm (image); 28.1 × 37.8 cm (outer framing line); 31.6 × 41.0 cm (trimmed sheet), a few spots of foxing, mounted.

A fine view looking across the Yarra River and the City of Melbourne from the Botanical Gardens, taken from Troedel’s The Melbourne album (Melbourne : Charles Troedel, circa 1864), one of the great Australian colourplate books, ‘perhaps the finest work of urban topography produced in Australia in the nineteenth century’ (Wantrup).

Troedel’s Melbourne Album was originally issued in twelve monthly parts, the first advertisement for subscribers was placed in the Argus on 25 July 1863 and the last issue finished in November 1864 (Butler). No set in the original wrappers is known to still exist. Each part contained two lithographs, and later in 1864 a bound version was published with all twenty-four lithographs. At the end of that year or early in 1865, a shortened version of twelve images was issued.

Ferguson, 17323-17326, Wantrup 262c; Butler, Roger, Printed images in Colonial Australia 1801 – 1901, pp. 167 – 172 (illustrated)