Transformations Harriet and Helena Scott, colonial Sydney’s finest natural history painters

The fascinating story of the Scott sisters, who transformed nature into art in their extraordinary paintings of butterflies and moths, is told here for the first time.With their collecting boxes, notebooks, and paintbrushes, Harriet and Helena Scott entered the masculine worlds of science and art and became two of nineteenth-century Australia’s most prominent natural history painters. Transformations tells the complete story of the Scott sisters for the first time—their early lives in colonial Sydney, their training as naturalists and artists on the isolated Ash Island, and their professional triumphs. This is a rare pictorial record of two talented and determined women who transformed nature into art in their extraordinary paintings.

Vanessa Finney is a curator, historian and archivist. At the Australian Museum, she manages the country’s oldest and largest natural history archives and rare books collection.