Hans Conrad Escher von der Linth

Hans Conrad Escher von der Linth was a Swiss politician, engineer, geologist and artist, born in Zurich in 1767 and dying there in 1823. He studied natural sciences at Göttingen, with Georg Christoph Lichtenberg among his teachers, and was drawn to the Alps from his time in Geneva, where he was influenced by the writings of Horace-Bénédict de Saussure. He held senior political office during the Helvetic Republic, as president of the Helvetic Great Council in 1798, and later led the Linth River project, Switzerland's first major public project carried out on a national scale, which reduced flooding in the Linth plain. He also conducted extensive geological research in the Swiss Alps, and more than 1,000 of his drawings and watercolours survive, which make him a pioneer of Alpine panorama art.