Mezzotint engraving Arnaud Éloi Gautier-d'Agoty (d. 1771). Cours complet d'anatomie peint et gravé en couleurs naturelles. Nancy: J. B. H. Leclerc, 1773 Print Collection, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, The New York Public Library     (220 k)

The best examples of anatomic illustration in the eighteenth century demonstrate the gradual progress in engraving from the Osteographia of William Cheselden to William Hunter's Gravid Uterus and the works of Sömmerring and Albinus. Colored copperplates were introduced in the early part of the eighteenth century by Jacques-Christophe Le Blon (1667—1741). But it was his assistant, Arnaud Éloi Gautier-d'Agoty, who first printed anatomical plates in color on a large scale. But Gautier-d'Agoty's striking mezzotints tended to be a little too artistic and fuzzy for serious anatomic illustration. The technique was not really suitable for accurate detail work.