Joyce Sidman

Newbery-Honor winning author Joyce Sidman explores the extraordinary life and scientific discoveries of Maria Merian, who discovered the truth about metamorphosis and documented the science behind the mystery in this visual biography that features many original paintings by Maria herself.

How Maria Merian's Art Changed Science

The Girl who Drew Butterflies

Kim Tyo-Dickerson

Outstanding YA biography of artist, adventurer and scientist Maria Merian who was fascinated by insects as a young girl in the 1600s. Through careful observations, drawings and experiments, she was the first person to debunk Artistotle's theory that insects came from "spontaneous generation", the belief that flies, wasps and other bugs emerged eerily out of mud, manure or the bodies of dead animals and not from other insects. This is a beautiful book with full-color illustrations by Merian throughout and sprinkled with poems by author Sidman that reflect Maria's growth from a curious young girl closely and painstakingly observing and drawing caterpillars, cocoons and butterflies, or "summer birds" as they were called in the 17th century, to a successful artist and businesswoman living independently in Surinam to continue her fieldwork to uncover the truth about metamorphosis and share her findings with the world.

The Girl who Drew Butterflies How Maria Merian's Art Changed Science

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