Chapter 2429: Sonia (VI)

Let the secrets sink into the sea of ignorance. Every time Sonia saw this globe, she thought of this phrase. She brought the globe to the office precisely to constantly remind herself:

The more of the Australians' knowledge you master, the closer you get to something terrifying.

She was somewhat unsettled. She might as well not stay in the office—she'd go to the specimen room and finish the work at hand first.

Just as Sonia was about to leave the office, there came a knock on the door.

"Come in!"

She thought it was her two "apprentices" returning, but unexpectedly, it was her "colleague": Valentina Marino.

Valentina was also one of the female slaves Quark had sold. She was an Italian woman—to be precise, a subject of the Papal States. North African pirates had raided the village where she lived, abducted her, and she was subsequently sold around until reaching Basra, then Lingao.

Compared to Sonia, Valentina Marino was a newcomer. She had been in Lingao less than two years.

Not long after arriving in Lingao, she was bought by Senator Dong Yizhi of the education sector. Senator Dong's maids, without exception, all taught at Fangcaodi. So initially his training plan for Valentina was the same. But he quickly realized the difficulty of training a girl who only spoke 17th-century Italian into a qualified teacher was too great—language training alone would take at least two or three years. Even if she could speak Chinese after several years, becoming a liberal arts or science teacher to impart knowledge would be difficult. After all, Valentina Marino in Italy was only semi-literate, capable of only simple reading and writing in Italian. Let alone changing to another language.

After much thought, Dong Yizhi suddenly got inspiration from her ethnic attribute: wasn't she Italian? Italy had produced quite a few artists. The Senate's official artist was also an Italian. Since that was the case, why not cultivate her as an artist?

So Valentina was sent to her compatriot Trini's studio, becoming his student and beginning her path to becoming an artist.

Trini naturally welcomed this compatriot from Italy. He hadn't seen an Italian-speaking compatriot in the Far East for many years. Of course, he was also very careful—after all, this young lady from the Papal States was now a Senator's maid.

After more than a year, Miss Valentina had roughly mastered basic sketching and color techniques and could draw still lifes and simple watercolor landscapes. According to the teaching curriculum, after completing the basic drawing course, she would need to consider her professional direction.

Contrary to what Dong Yizhi expected, Valentina didn't show much talent in painting. Although her technique would be good enough to take the national art qualification exam in the 21st century and reach the provincial undergraduate cutoff score, Trini's evaluation of her work was: "Accurate perspective, attention to detail, poor grasp of light and shadow. Overall works are stiff and lack vitality."

Obviously, it was impossible to cultivate her into a 17th-century versatile artist. Dong Yizhi couldn't figure out what to do either, so he instructed Trini to continue teaching her in the painting direction—she could become an art teacher at Fangcaodi in the future. At this moment, the Natural History Museum in preparation extended an olive branch to her.

The Natural History Museum needed a professional painter—to be precise, a "natural history illustrator."

In an era before photography was invented, the only way to visually record something, someone, or some object was drawing. For natural history, even into the 19th century when photography existed, limited by the photographic and printing technology of the time, photographs' representation of objects still lacked sufficient detail.

At the time, almost every natural history scholar or enthusiast who personally went into the field, besides bringing back specimens and recording written descriptions, often also doubled as an artist doing highly faithful special illustrations—during the long span before humanity invented high-resolution imaging technology, they used painting to document things.

Although naturalists could preserve animal and plant forms and bodies through specimen collection, whether fluid-preserved or dry-mounted (taxidermy), specimens that lost life would quickly dry out and deform, losing their fresh state. This was especially obvious in plant specimens. Moreover, plant specimen collection was affected by seasons, making it difficult to represent the full life-cycle form in one collection.

In contrast, detailed paintings could very completely and comprehensively display animal and plant forms. On a single sheet of paper, one could depict every fine detail of a species' roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits, seeds, and so on, presenting corresponding close-up details entirely according to scientific needs, with scale bars attached.

Thus, natural history illustration, this special form of painting, came into being. This special drawing technique had very ancient origins. At least in the Renaissance era, Leonardo da Vinci and others' manuscripts already had similar drawing techniques. If tracing back even further, in classical natural history works of various civilizations around the world, authors had already begun attempting to use simple drawings to depict various animal and plant forms.

Natural history illustration developed from early line drawings and sketches, developing corresponding distinctive painting technique schools. It thrived until the 20th century. Even in the old timeline's 21st century, this painting technique was still applied in some fields. A typical example was medical anatomy diagrams. Anyone who had studied medicine was familiar with such diagrams. And geological survey personnel also mostly mastered a special type of natural history illustration: geological terrain sketching.

Even in the old timeline where high-definition photography had become cheap and universal, various professional atlases still chose natural history illustrations rather than photographs. This showed its practical value.

Besides a few Senators from geological surveying backgrounds who could draw geological sketches, the Remote Survey Team Senators actually didn't have the ability to draw natural history illustrations. And this ability was very important for 17th-century surveys, so the survey team began cultivating this ability as soon as it was established.

However, there wasn't actually anyone in the Senate who could draw natural history illustrations. So this matter basically relied on self-study using materials from the Grand Library.

Although painting depended on talent, under the guidance of experienced teachers, with zero foundation and three years of intensive high school preparation, getting into the eight major art academies was still achievable. The problem was the Senate at the time didn't have "experienced teachers" or professional painters. Mastering natural history illustration techniques through self-study was obviously quite difficult. After much struggle, except for some Senators from geological surveying backgrounds who had sketching foundations, everyone else's results were hard to speak of.

Trini's arrival brought them hope. This Italian painter, although just a nobody in art history, undeniably his painting skills crushed all five hundred Senators combined. Dr. Zhong thus handed him various reference materials compiled by the Grand Library regarding natural history illustration techniques along with several picture books for him to study and copy. At the same time, Bai Guoshi and Zhao Xue were specially assigned to study under him. Because Trini's observation was still an artist's observation—he had to be taught to observe with a scientist's eye.

Professionals were indeed professionals. Trini didn't disappoint. Within half a year, he had roughly mastered the relevant natural history illustration techniques. Bai and Zhao, this couple's results were also quite good.

Dr. Zhong's confidence greatly increased. He immediately submitted a proposal to the Planning Agency under the name "Technology is the Primary Productive Force," suggesting temporarily halting all of Trini's painting and decorative work to focus exclusively on natural history illustration training. The training targets were naturalized citizen students who had already mastered basic painting skills like sketching and color in Trini's training class.

As soon as the news spread, it received an enthusiastic response. Only then did Dr. Zhong learn that various departments all had demand for natural history illustration. The medical and agricultural sectors had especially strong demand.

Due to the strong demand, the Planning Agency not only approved Dr. Zhong's suggestion but also specially coordinated. They decided the first cohort of students would temporarily not be assigned but would extend their training period as "natural history illustration normal students." After these students graduated, they would serve as "seed" teachers at the "Natural History Illustration Training Class."

Valentina Marino was one of these "seeds"—but because of her special status, plus the bonus of being compatriots, Trini gave her special attention, often personally instructing her. Calling it "direct transmission" wasn't an exaggeration.

After the six-month natural history illustration training class ended, Valentina, who was originally supposed to "stay and teach," was specially transferred to the Natural History Museum, becoming a dedicated natural history illustrator.

Natural history illustration was certainly not unfamiliar to Sonia, but honestly her painting skills were very limited. Plus pregnancy and childbirth, she hadn't been able to receive professional natural history illustration training, so in many tasks she had to rely on dedicated natural history illustrators like Valentina Marino.

"Miss Sharper! All the paintings from the expedition are done. Please review them." Valentina was actually younger than Sonia, but her personality was quiet and steady. Although they were both Senators' maids, Valentina, born to a farming commoner family, naturally had class-based respect for the aristocrat-born Sonia.

Sonia didn't speak Italian, and Valentina had previously only spoken Italian. So their communication was through a Senate "Newspeak." This was also the common communication method among foreign maids.

"Wonderful." Sonia's spirits lifted. This batch of natural history illustrations was drawn from living plants and specimens brought back by the recently returned Eastern Taiwan expedition. Sonia had already surveyed many areas in south and west Taiwan, but knew little about the eastern Taiwan area called a "land island."

The Hualien expedition that started half a year ago—she hadn't been selected as she had just given birth, which was somewhat regrettable. Being able to personally see the results now was at least consolation.

(End of Chapter)