William Matthew Hart (1830-1908) was an Irish-born English bird illustrator and lithographer who worked for

John Gould John Gould (; 14 September 1804 – 3 February 1881) was an English ornithologist. He published a number of monographs on birds, illustrated by plates produced by his wife, Elizabeth Gould, and several other artists, including Edward Lear, ...

. Hart started medical training, but was unable to complete his studies for financial reasons. He began working for Gould in 1851, beginning an association that was to last thirty years. Early during this period he made the patterns for the

lithographic Lithography () is a planographic method of printing originally based on the immiscibility of oil and water. The printing is from a stone (lithographic limestone) or a metal plate with a smooth surface. It was invented in 1796 by the German a ...

plates for Gould's work on

hummingbirds Hummingbirds are birds native to the Americas and comprise the biological family Trochilidae. With about 361 species and 113 genera, they occur from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, but the vast majority of the species are found in the tropics aro ...

, as well as working on ''The Birds of Great Britain'' with

Henry Constantine Richter Henry Constantine Richter (7 June 1821 – 16 March 1902) was an English zoological illustrator who produced a very large number of skillful coloured lithographs of birds and mammals, mainly for the scientific books of the renowned English 1 ...

. By 1870 Hart had become Gould's chief artist and lithographer. After Gould's death in 1881, Hart was employed by

Richard Bowdler Sharpe Richard Bowdler Sharpe (22 November 1847 – 25 December 1909) was an English zoologist and ornithologist who worked as curator of the bird collection at the British Museum of natural history. In the course of his career he published several mo ...

of the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

to complete Gould's work on the birds of New Guinea and to produce illustrations for Sharpe's monograph on the

birds-of-paradise The birds-of-paradise are members of the family Paradisaeidae of the order Passeriformes. The majority of species are found in eastern Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and eastern Australia. The family has 44 species in 17 genera. The members of ...

References

1830 births 1908 deaths Scientific illustrators English lithographers People from Walworth British bird artists 19th-century English painters English male painters 19th-century English male artists {{England-painter-stub