Jessie Wei-Hsuan Chen
LightNews LightNews
banner
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Jessie Wei-Hsuan Chen
@jessiewhchen.bsky.social
440 followers 310 following 78 posts
Historian of art, science, and knowledge. Postdoc #VisualizingTheUnknown, @huygensknaw.bsky.social. Also a maker.

https://jessieweihsuanchen.com/
Posts Replies Media Videos
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Join us in The Hague on 3 December for my book presentation! 🌷🌻🌵

Look forward to sharing some findings, an exciting panel on practical knowledge with amazing colleagues, and a pop-up show on reconstructions/creative works from the project.

Register: tickets.kb.nl/nl-NL/Show/D...

See you there! 🌺
Flyer for the book presentation, with the text reads as the following. Left-hand side: Book Presentation, 3 December 2025, KB, National Library, Prins Willem-Alexanderhof 5, The Hague Right-hand side: Programme 14:00 Walk-in 14:30 Welcome and opening, Esther van Gelder (KB, nationale bibliotheek), Editors of series Emergence of Natural History and De Gruyter Brill. 14:50 Book presentation, Jessie Wei-Hsuan Chen (Huygens Instituut/KNAW). 15:10 Gifting of physical copies 15:15 Panel discussion: State of the field(s) and practical knowledge Moderator: Marieke Hendriksen (Huygens Instituut/KNAW) Panelists: Marlise Rijks (Vrije Universiteit Brussel), Sietske Fransen (Bibliotheca Hertziana/Max Planck Institute), Trude Dijkstra (Universiteit van Amsterdam), Jessie Wei-Hsuan Chen (Huygens Instituut/KNAW). 16:00 Introduction to pop-up show. Display of reconstructions and creative projects related to the book. 16:15 Drinks / Borrel, Opportunity to see the pop-up show and book table featuring volumes from the Emergence of Natural History series. 17:00 End of event Free admission with limited space. Please register at https://tickets.kb.nl/nl-NL/Show/Details/Book-presentation- Everlasting-Flower-Between-the-Pages--3-dec-134063. Link to book: https://brill.com/display/title/70483 Photograph of almost two hundred sheets of paper with dots painted with many colours. Photograph of an arrangement of, in clockwise order, a colour sample book, a watercolour of a tulip bouquet on paper, an album of monochromatic flower pictures, and a watercolour on parchment that shows several kinds of colourful flowers and the used colour palette on a separate piece of parchment. Photograph of an arrangement of objects, including a box, two trays from the box, the spread of colour swatches from one of the volumes in the collection, colour tests from the process book, and a watercolour of two purple autumn crocuses displayed on a book stand.
November 18, 2025 at 2:05 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Printed copies of Everlasting Flowers are gorgeous! But the digital version is #openaccess for anyone to read: brill.com/display/titl....

A book presentation takes place at the KB in The Hague on 3 December. You are warmly invited! To register: tickets.kb.nl/nl-NL/Show/D...

Please share!
Printed copies of the book, with one copy open to pages 196 and 197, and the two that are stacked showing the cover. Flyer for the book presentation, with the text reads as the following. Left-hand side: Book Presentation, 3 December 2025, KB, National Library, Prins Willem-Alexanderhof 5, The Hague Right-hand side: Programme 14:00 Walk-in 14:30 Welcome and opening, Esther van Gelder (KB, nationale bibliotheek), Editors of series Emergence of Natural History and De Gruyter Brill. 14:50 Book presentation, Jessie Wei-Hsuan Chen (Huygens Instituut/KNAW). 15:10 Gifting of physical copies 15:15 Panel discussion: State of the field(s) and practical knowledge Moderator: Marieke Hendriksen (Huygens Instituut/KNAW) Panelists: Marlise Rijks (Vrije Universiteit Brussel), Sietske Fransen (Bibliotheca Hertziana/Max Planck Institute), Trude Dijkstra (Universiteit van Amsterdam), Jessie Wei-Hsuan Chen (Huygens Instituut/KNAW). 16:00 Introduction to pop-up show. Display of reconstructions and creative projects related to the book. 16:15 Drinks / Borrel, Opportunity to see the pop-up show and book table featuring volumes from the Emergence of Natural History series. 17:00 End of event Free admission with limited space. Please register at https://tickets.kb.nl/nl-NL/Show/Details/Book-presentation- Everlasting-Flower-Between-the-Pages--3-dec-134063. Link to book: https://brill.com/display/title/70483
September 24, 2025 at 12:34 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
I found a unique lampworking workshop where I learned how to make mung bean sprouts when visiting family in Taiwan last month. These are not skilled glasswork, but I have made my first models of economic botany of some sort! With a bonus clear sprout for further experimentation with glass painting.
Photo of the author pulling a cane from a white glass rod in front of a torch. Photo of five pieces of mung bean sprouts made of glass. One is in clear glass, two have translucent white stems and light yellow embryos, and two have translucent white stems and green embryos.
August 26, 2025 at 1:20 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Back to the #MuseumBoerhaave to work with two rare compound microscopes from the 17th-c., one made by Giuseppe Campani and another attributed to John Marshall as the maker. So many new thoughts emerged from observing how colors and form changed under the lenses. #VisualizingTheUnknown #histsci
Photo with a microscope attributed to John Marshall as the maker in the front and a microscope made by Giuseppe Campani in the back. A tiny slice of a dandelion stem under on a petri dish under the lens. Magnified view of the dandelion stem slice when it was hydrated, showing vibrant greens in coloration. Magnified view of the dandelion stem slice when it was almost dried, becoming more shriveled in form and brown in coloration.
June 23, 2025 at 6:17 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Last highlight was a lunch talk at the uni. Herbaria to share my current research. So happy to see many interested people; the room was pretty packed. Got a bonus tour to more items at the Herbaria afterwards, including some stunning wax fruit from early 20th-c Japan from economic botany collection!
Photo of Jessie giving a talk. A box of fifteen wax apples of various sizes and colors. Close-up of a red wax apple.
June 18, 2025 at 3:38 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Another major event was studying the famous Blaschka glass flowers on site. It was amazing to examine these incredible models in person, together with the collection manager & conservator. I also got to spend some time in the archive consulting some historical documents on the glass flowers.
Display cases in the glass flower room at the Harvard Museum of Natural History. Display cases in the glass flower room at the Harvard Museum of Natural History. Glass model of the Encelia californica (California Brittlebush). Glass model of the development of Marchantia polymorpha, a kind of liverwort.
June 18, 2025 at 3:38 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Students then tried their hands at woodcutting in the 16th-c. manner. Several students liked the technique so much that they returned for more woodcutting the following week during their free experiment times!
Work stations for sixteenth-century woodcutting experiments. 22 inked woodblocks carrying various letters from the alphabet and other images.
June 18, 2025 at 3:38 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
I visited Harvard Uni. the past two weeks. A major event was giving a workshop for the Summer Institute for Technical Studies in Art @ Art Museums. For the theme Experiment, I showed how I incorporate historical reconstruction/hands-on research in my past/present projects & the related experiments.
A slide showing, on the top half, a photo of an arrangement of art materials and images made in several mediums, and, on the bottom half, the title of the presentation, "Experimenting with Historical Reconstruction".
June 18, 2025 at 3:38 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
@l-teixeiracosta.bsky.social & I are excited to see many have signed up. There are still seats left, so register if you would like to join us for the #PlantHumanities Colloquium at @meertens-knaw.bsky.social / @huygensknaw.bsky.social, or online!

Register through forms.office.com/e/YUJEB4GzuE.
Banner image for the Plant Humanities KNAW-Huc, featuring an orange daylily in front of a green background. Poster for the Plant Humanities KNAW-HuC. Description on the poster: Plant Humanities has emerged as a convergence point for multiple disciplines interested in the connections between plants and people. Such convergence has the potential to address important questions of today, such as climate change, biodiversity decline, and decolonization of knowledge. This colloquium brings together researchers in Plant Humanities in the Netherlands to showcase the many ways in which people have related to plants in the past and present. Program: 10:15–10:30, Check-in and Coffee; 10:30–11:00, Welcome and Short Introduction; 11:00–11:30, Becoming Global? Practices of Collecting, Naming and Exchanging Seeds in Early Modern Botany by Melinda Susanto (Huygens Instituut / KNAW); 11:30–12:00, Plants that Adorn and Construct Social Bodies: Body Ornaments in the Amazon Region by Caroline Fernandes Caromano (Naturalis Biodiversity Center), 12:00–13:30, Lunch; 13:30–14:00, Wild Tulips in Historical Dutch Gardens: Where Do They Come From? by Anastasia Stefanaki (Utrecht University Botanic Gardens); 14:00–14:30, Picturing and Representing Plants in the Past: Materials, Techniques, and Artisanal Knowledge by Jessie Wei-Hsuan Chen (Huygens Instituut / KNAW); 14:30–15:00, Plants, People, and Cities: From Sao Paulo, Brazil to Amsterdam, Netherlands by Luiza Teixeira-Costa (Meertens Instituut / KNAW); 15:00–16:00, Discussion and moving forward; 16:00–17:00, Drinks. Additional info: Seats are limited and offered on a first-come, first-served basis; Register before 9 May to receive the link to the live streaming; This event will not be recorded.
May 1, 2025 at 1:27 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Want to learn more about the exciting research in #PlantHumanities in the Netherlands? Then join us on 13 May at the Spinhuis in Amsterdam or online!

Register through forms.office.com/e/YUJEB4GzuE before 9 May. Please share!
Poster for the Plant Humanities KNAW-HuC. Description on the poster: Plant Humanities has emerged as a convergence point for multiple disciplines interested in the connections between plants and people. Such convergence has the potential to address important questions of today, such as climate change, biodiversity decline, and decolonization of knowledge. This colloquium brings together researchers in Plant Humanities in the Netherlands to showcase the many ways in which people have related to plants in the past and present. Program: 10:15–10:30, Check-in and Coffee; 10:30–11:00, Welcome and Short Introduction; 11:00–11:30, Becoming Global? Practices of Collecting, Naming and Exchanging Seeds in Early Modern Botany by Melinda Susanto (Huygens Instituut / KNAW); 11:30–12:00, Plants that Adorn and Construct Social Bodies: Body Ornaments in the Amazon Region by Caroline Fernandes Caromano (Naturalis Biodiversity Center), 12:00–13:30, Lunch; 13:30–14:00, Wild Tulips in Historical Dutch Gardens: Where Do They Come From? by Anastasia Stefanaki (Utrecht University Botanic Gardens); 14:00–14:30, Picturing and Representing Plants in the Past: Materials, Techniques, and Artisanal Knowledge by Jessie Wei-Hsuan Chen (Huygens Instituut / KNAW); 14:30–15:00, Plants, People, and Cities: From Sao Paulo, Brazil to Amsterdam, Netherlands by Luiza Teixeira-Costa (Meertens Instituut / KNAW); 15:00–16:00, Discussion and moving forward; 16:00–17:00, Drinks. Additional info: Seats are limited and offered on a first-come, first-served basis; Register before 9 May to receive the link to the live streaming; This event will not be recorded.
April 24, 2025 at 1:15 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Took students of NIKI/Huygens course "From Leonardo to Steno" to the Opificio delle Pietre Dure last Friday. Excellent collection for discussing early modern art, science, & material practices and for exercising looking closely by drawing textures. We were amazed by the incredible stone paintings!
Photo of a stone painting featuring a bouquet in a vase in the center, surrounded by a border with a geometric pattern. Photo of a section of the museum, showing historical workstations for cutting, grinding, and polishing stones, with a wall-to-wall display of different kinds of precious stones used for pietre dure in the background. Photo of a display case that shows the different stages of making a pietra dure, including the initial watercolor, model drawing for transfer, small sections of stones that are joined to create part of the image, and different kinds of stones as the color palette. Photo of a piece of the Terra del Paese di Rimaggio, or Marna (Paesina).
April 7, 2025 at 5:01 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Another article I'm working on within the #VisualizingTheUnknown project is about historical three-dimensional representations of plant anatomy. What a treat to be able to see these incredible 18th- and 19th-c. wax botanical models at #LaSpecola in Florence. #histsci
Photo of many wax botanical models in pots on display. The models are in life-size to the modeled plants. The walls and display shelves are painted in green. Photo showing the wax botanical model of "Cactus truncastus" in front of a green wall. The plant is placed in a pot with an oval cartouche that shows the name of the plant, as known in the eighteenth century. Next to the pot (to the bottom right of the picture plane) is a small wax model showing the flower head that is cut in half and placed on a ceramic dish shaped like a seashell. Photo of wax models of plant anatomy displayed on shelves. The walls have pink wallpaper and the shelves are also painted pink. Photo of a set of wax models showing the physiological preparation of Cucurbita pepo under a glass case.
April 1, 2025 at 3:30 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
This block was for an event at the National Library of the Netherlands (KB) back in February. Finally able to finish it!

Image Source: Dialogus Creatorum/Twespraec der creaturen (Gouda: Gerard Leeu 1481[?]).

#renaissancewoodcutting #woodcut #woodblock #blockprinting #printmaking #reliefprinting
A photo featuring a woodblock and a printed impression, together with the used tools for cutting, including three kinds of knives and a gouge.
March 29, 2025 at 12:28 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Test run of working w/ #EarlyModern #microscopes at the Museum Boerhaave for a new article I'm starting! A big part of #visualizingtheunknown is to better understand what early microscopists saw & the encountered challenges by redoing their observations. Back for more observations soon. #histsci
Photo showing a dead bee pinned under an 18th-century microscope for scientific observation and microscopic research.
March 6, 2025 at 4:38 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Received my copy two weeks ago but only able to open the parcel now! Exciting book edited by @sarahabendall.bsky.social and @serenadyer.bsky.social.

More info: www.aup.nl/en/book/9789...

Get 20% off with discount code “AUP20”, valid until 31 March 2025.
Photo of the book cover for Embodied Experiences of Making in Early Modern Europe. Photo of the first page of chapter 7, titled "Remaking Sixteenth-Century Botanical Woodblocks: Embodied Artisanal Knowledge in Early Modern Woodcutting."
March 5, 2025 at 1:45 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
I talked about some of the stunning botanical books in the Teylers collections on day 2 of VisionLab! We focused on the various book formats and how the physical sizes of the picture planes affected the depictions of plants & microscopic observations. #VisualizingtheUnknown
Hand-colored engraving of a crown imperial flower and bulb from Basilius Besler's Hortus Eystettensis (1613). Tab. 56 that depicts the backside of the Theca, the belly of the Theca, the column of the magnifid, flower of Hyoscyanus, one of the spermatick Thecae, the edges of the Theca open, and the column in the middle of the flower. From Nehemiah Grew's The anatomy of plants (1682). Hand-colored etching of various parts of wheat in the Blackwellianum Herbarium (1750-1773).
December 18, 2024 at 5:55 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Jumping right into action with day 1 of VisionLab, in which we looked at books on butterflies & moths at the Teylers Museum, Haarlem. Discussions centered around how to visualize microscopic observations of the insects through prints and related challenges. #VisualizingtheUnknown
A hand-colored etching depicting different life stages of a pease blossom moth on a branch of the great mogul plum in Benjamin Wilkes' The English moths and butterflies (1747-1760) Hand-colored etching depicting the different life stages of a peacock butterfly in Jan Christiaan Sepp's De wonderen Gods in de minst-geachte schepselen [1762-1860] A plate depicting the muscles of a dissected caterpillar in Pierre Lyonet's Traité anatomique de la chenille (1762) Photo of the library at the Teylers Museum in Haarlem
December 17, 2024 at 5:21 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
This block was very suitable for practicing cutting curved lines.

Image source: Acanthide from Conrad Gessner's Historiae Animalium Liber III. qui est de Avium natura (1585).
Photo showing an arrangement of a printing woodblock and its printed impression next to the cutting tools of three knives, a gouge, and a chisel.
November 19, 2024 at 4:45 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Herbarium? is a project I recently completed. The idea and material collecting process started in 2022 when I was looking into early modern pressed plants as a small part of my PhD research. You can now see the creative project through the link:

jessiewhchen.wixsite.com/madebyjessie...
November 12, 2024 at 9:28 AM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Early modern whales are so fun too look at.

Image source: a whale from Conrad Gessner's Nomenclator aquatilium animantium (1606).
September 25, 2024 at 10:04 AM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
This small block of a smiley fish was a good one for practicing cutting hatching.

Image source: an unknown fish from Conrad Gessner's Nomenclator aquatilium animantium (1606).
June 2, 2024 at 10:26 AM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Practicing for upcoming collab w/ bookbinder/toolmaker Brien Beidler on a woodcutting experimentation we've had in mind since few years ago. It'll still take some time, but the wheels are turning! Image is a decoration from the Nederlantze Hesperides (1676) at a reduced size.
May 5, 2024 at 8:20 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Branching into toolmaking! Had the pleasure to follow part of the workshop by the skillful&talented Brien Beidler at the Fopma Wier, Leeuwarden. My first homemade finishing tool for leather stamping/bookbinding features a simple flower. Now I should actually get into bookbinding.
April 7, 2024 at 3:21 PM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Looking forward to 25 January on some flower talk. All welcomed! Register through: www.history.ac.uk/events/carin...
January 19, 2024 at 7:19 AM
jessiewhchen.bsky.social
Teamed up with Henrike Scholten from Durare Project to find some handmade papers with different properties. The paper mill De Middelste Molen in Loenen offers factory tours and many paper options. Always a delight to pull a sheet of paper from the vat!
December 6, 2023 at 7:20 PM