The works in this exhibition have been selected, in collaboration with Sir David Attenborough, from six remarkable and diverse groups of natural history drawings and watercolours in the Royal Collection. They date from the late fifteenth century to the early eighteenth century, a period when European knowledge of the world’s flora and fauna was transformed by voyages of discovery to Africa, Asia and the Americas. Through painstaking examination and description, these artists (and one collector) hoped to comprehend the natural riches of an ever-expanding world.

There is a common denominator that links all these artists – the profound joy that all feel who observe the natural world with a sustained and devoted intensity.

Sir David Attenborough