With his accurate, heavily detailed images of insects he was recognised as an important figure in modern entomology.

Rösel’s father died when he was very young and it was his uncle who gave him an artistic education after his godmother, the princess Augusta Dorothea von Arnstadt-Schwarzburg, had detected his talent.

He continued studies of art at the Academy of Nuremberg (1724–1726) where he became a very gifted painter of portraits and miniatures, which enabled him to join the Danish court of Copenhagen in 1726.

Recovering from a disease, he discovered the work of Anna Maria Sibylla Merian, Metamorphosis insectorum Surinamensium (1647–1717) in which she described the insects and other animals which she observed in Surinam.

[1] His artistic talent gave him a very good reputation so that he lived comfortably while painting and he could use his spare time to observe insects, amphibians and reptiles in nature.