Gerrit Wartenaar

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Gerrit Wartenaar (Amsterdam, May 28, 1747 - Amsterdam, June 6, 1803) is a Dutch and hardly known painter. His name is not in one of the manuels. Gerrit Wartenaar was the son of Lambertus Wartenaar, a mapmaker.^[1] In 1772 Gerrit married a fifteen year older woman, Maria Spekman. Both were living in the same neigborhood, known as the Jordaan.

Pieter Cramer, the director of a scientifical society in Zealand assembled an extensive natural history collection of colourful butterflies and moths (Lepidoptera). In his will Cramer commissioned to publish the drawings he had ordered. Between 1775-1782 four volumes appeared in Amsterdam of De uitlandsche Kapellen voorkomende in de drie Waereld-Deelen Asia, Africa en America - Papillons exotiques des trois parties du monde l'Asie, l'Afrique et l'Amerique.

When Cramer died during the preparations Caspar Stoll took over the responsibility for the project. 270 People subscribed, who enjoyed some reduction.^[2] Every three months an issue was delivered. Not Stoll, producing 25 issues and the supplement, but Wartenaar was the draughtsman of the plates.

The drawings are scientifically very accurate although somewhat stylized. Wartenaar positioned each specimen in a pleasing decorative arrangement, perhaps reflecting the position of specimens in the collector's cabinet of curiosities. As most of the insect specimens used by Cramer and Stoll to describe new species have long since perished, the original drawings now have a special scientific status as iconotypes.

Wartenaar lived all his life on Egelantiersgracht. In 1781 he drew a map of his neighborhood.^[3] Gerrit Wartenaar, a childless widower, was buried in Westerkerk.

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[edit] External link

• Birth certificate of Gerrit Wartenaar