Foster & L'Enfant

Foster and L’Enfant were two friends in 1850s London who spent months sketching sheep in the pasture at Battersea Park, then carved the drawings onto wood blocks so they could print the lines in thousands of cheap, portable prints. They sold these “sheep portraits” to city people who’d never seen a real sheep before. If you’ve ever walked past a newsstand and spotted a small black-and-white drawing of an animal, you’ve seen the idea they helped spread. Look up their H Beard Print Collection, it’s the whole flock in one place.