Windows on Nature: The Great Habitat Dioramas of the American Museum of Natural History (Hardcover)

~ Stephen Christopher Quinn (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

New York City's American Museum of Natural History is a national treasure, attracting four million visitors annually. Its dioramas-a dazzling mixture of nature, science, and art-have inspired young and old alike, and are world-renowned examples of the unique diorama craft: art in the service of science. Now, in the only book of its kind, readers get an insider's view of these "windows on nature," witnessing their creation step by meticulous step.

More than forty of the museum's finest dioramas are featured here, depicting the fauna and flora of myriad ecological environments. Stephen Quinn, a diorama artist at the museum, introduces the explorers, naturalists, painters, sculptors, taxidermists, and conservationists behind these three-dimensional marvels, and explains how their collaborations make the displays so lifelike. This enchanting book is the perfect gift for nature lovers, art enthusiasts, and museum goers everywhere.

About the Author

Stephen Christopher Quinn joined the staff of the American Museum of Natural History in 1974. As senior project manager for exhibitions, Quinn oversees all aspects of new diorama creation, conservation, and restoration. A longtime member of the Society of Animal Artists, Quinn lives in Ridgefield Park, New Jersey.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 180 pages
• Publisher: "Harry N. Abrams, Inc."; First Edition, First Printing edition (March 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0810959402
• ISBN-13: 978-0810959408
• Product Dimensions: 11.2 x 10.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #219,643 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What a Gem!, June 3, 2006

By	D. Vandervalk (Thousand Oaks, CA) - See all my reviews

I found this treasure at my local bookstore (could have got it cheaper here!), looked it over, walked away, came back and looked again, walked away again, but couldn't find anything else I wanted as badly. It is an elegant masterpiece. I happen to thrill at anything remotely connected to taxidermy, but this book will also interest those who like nature, museums, or art.

This book is specifically about the dioramas of one museum, but in telling how they were constructed - taxidermy, foreground, and background painting - it is enlightening to anyone who loves natural history museums in general. There are color photos of the dioramas today, and black-and-whites of the artists working on various stages of their development decades ago. The step-by-step pictures of how a huge elephant mount is put together are nothing short of fascinating. Then, in addition, there are behind the scenes stories about how each diorama came together, and some hair-raising tales of specimen collecting in Africa.

If I have a complaint, it is this: the author has written the text as if only addressing fellow New Yorkers, assuming his readers have already been to this museum and seen these dioramas in person. "Think back to your memories of visits to the grand diorama galleries of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City." I can't help but feel a bit excluded, having never been there, although I am perfectly able to appreciate the exhibits based on the museums I have had the pleasure to visit. Perhaps he underestimated the broader appeal this book would have, but at any rate he unknowingly sparks a desire in the rest of us to try to get there someday!

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars As visually impressive as it is informative, April 2, 2006

By	Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

A work as visually impressive as it is informative, Windows On Nature: The Great Habitat Dioramas Of The American Museum Of Natural History is drawn from the studies of Stephen Christopher Quinn and presents a simply outstanding collection of the artistic creation of the animal and nature oriented displays since the museum's founding in 1869. Bringing together, for the first time in one superbly organized and unique collection, the artistic contributions of this New York based museum of natural history, Windows On Nature gives readers a chance to see the many inspiring (and sometimes incongruous) works of contributors to the great historical museum diorama displays. Windows On Nature is especially recommend-ed for academic and community library collections, as well as American Museum Of Natural History visitors and those engaged in study of nature-oriented art.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Monuments to Wilderness, September 16, 2007

By	Carl Ramm (Anchorage, AK USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

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There is nowhere beneath a roof, anywhere on earth, that means more to me than the great diorama halls of The American Museum of Natural History. It is stunning (and, really, rather sad) that it has taken this long for a popular book to be written about these magnificent works of art and science, but at least it has been done well. (It is also gratifying to see the book getting such good--and well deserved--reviews here.)

For many millions of people habitat dioramas have been their first taste of the beauty, calm, and nobility of wild creatures and wild places. More people are familiar with nature documentaries these days, and since I love good documentaries too I can't really complain about that. Nonetheless there are some things that habitat dioramas, when done well, can convey that the flickering image, even on an IMAX screen, just can't. No medium portrays the spacious calm of wild country, and the simple dignity of wild animals, better than dioramas. It's also important to remember the valuable record dioramas can provide: many of the dioramas in this book are of places no longer wild.

Stephen Quinn's credentials for writing this book are probably as good as anyone alive. He started as an artist for the museum and has been an important force in helping keep the medium alive through the dark years of the 60s to 80s, when across the U.S. it was frequently neglected, if not despised, by curators though not, blessedly, by the general public. Things are at least somewhat better now, and Mr. Quinn is now project manager for exhibitions at the museum. He has done a fine job with this book. The text is engaging and informative and the photos are big and beautiful.

I do have a few quibbles. He sometimes uses the word "captured" for animals collected (read killed) for the dioramas. I'm sympathetic with why he felt he had to do that, given what he's trying to do with the book and given the cultural forces with which he must contend. The moral issues behind hunting and museum collection are complex and beyond what a book like this could be expected to cover. Nonetheless, animals are never "captured" for taxidermy.

I should hasten to add that animals do not need to be killed specifically for taxidermy. Many if not most animals mounted for museums in the last few decades died in zoos, were hit by automobile traffic, etc. That generally was not a realistic option at the time these dioramas were created.

My other reservation is deeper, but harder to articulate, and I don't have a real solution to it. I also know that a lot of readers will be unsympathetic with it. I'm not completely comfortable with "behind the scenes" stuff in anything other than technical manuals, trade magazines, etc. The people who made these dioramas were of course just people but had high ideals (ideals that Mr. Quinn without question shares) and they wanted the dioramas to be about their _subjects_. His behind the scenes writing will engage people more with the medium and is interesting in itself, no argument. But how much does it really help to have people thinking "I wonder if that rock in Diorama Z is the one that employees used to go to make out behind on their lunch hour."?

I don't know the answer, and so I can't really fault the author. I also recognize that many of the reviewers here loved that aspect of the book. My hope, and I'm sure it's the author's as well, is that it will all stay in perspective. Let's hope that's right. It would be very sad to see dioramas become the subject of the kind of psychologizing and trivializing that permeates the world of "fine" art.

That said, this is a beautiful and well-written book about a noble, if often neglected, realm of art and natural history. If you've read through a long review like this one about a book on this subject, I promise you won't regret owning it.