Person

Schoenfeld, Friedrich Karl (Fritz) (1810 - 1868)

Born
25 January 1810
Wiesbaden, Germany
Died
21 September 1868
Richmond, Victoria, Australia
Occupation
Botanical artist, Lithographer and Zoological artist

Summary

Friedrich Schoenfeld was a artist and lithographer who worked in Mainz (Germany) and Winterthur (Switzerland), before coming to Melbourne in 1858. Here he worked as a freelancer, coming to the attention of Ferdinand Mueller. From April 1859 Schoenfeld produced illustrations and lithographs that were published in the first six volumes of Mueller's Fragmenta phytographiae australiae , his Plants indigenous to the colony of Victoriaand Vegetation of the Chatham Islands . These are considered to be among the most accomplished lithographs produced in the world at the time. Schoenfeld also worked for Frederick McCoy, Professor of Natural Philosophy at the University of Melbourne: these lithographs were published in the 1870s in McCoy's Prodromus of the zoology of Victoria and Prodromus of the palaeontology of Victoria. From 1862 to 1866 Schoenfeld taught drawing at the Melbourne Deutsche Verein, this position coming to an end when the Verein's premises burned down. After that he had difficulty earning a living and thought to return to Switzerland (which did not happen).

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Details

Chronology

8 May 1858
Life event - Arrived in Melbourne
1859
Career event - Engaged by Ferdinand Mueller to prepare illustrations for several publications
June 1859 - November 1862
Career event - Prepared illustrations for Frederick McCoy's publications

Related People

Published resources

Books

  • Mueller, Ferdinand Baron von, Fragmenta phytographiae australiae, 12 vols (Melbourne: auctoritate gubern. coloni Victori, ex officina Joannis Ferres, 1858-1882). Details

Resources

See also

  • Darragh, Thomas A., Engravers and lithographers in colonial Victoria: a directory (Melbourne: Ancora Press, 2023), 321 pp. Details

Helen Cohn

Created: 3 September 2026

EOAS ID: biogs/P008153b.htm

This Edition: 2026 August - Bibliographies
Larneuk - Gariwerd calendar - Pre-spring: late July to August - season of nesting birds
Reference: https://www.bom.gov.au/resources/indigenous-weather-knowledge/indigenous-seasonal-calendars/gariwerd-calendar#bom-anchor-list__item-larneuk-season-of-nesting-birds

Publisher: Swinburne University of Technology.

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"... the rengitj, as a visible mark or imprint on the land, is characterised as a place of origin, the repository of all names, as well as a kind of mapped visual expression of the connection between people and places which is to be carried out in the temporal sequence of the journey." Fanca Tamisari (1998) 'Body, Vision and Movement: In the footprints of the ancestors'. Oceania 68(4) p260