Birds in the News: Feathered Muses

The New York Times has a great article and slideshow about birds as the inspiration for artists throughout history. The piece surveys a handful of new books on the subject, kicking off with some colorful details about the big kahuna himself, John James Audubon. (i.e., We learn how Audubon got a Golden Eagle to pose for a portrait. It wasn’t by asking nicely.)

Other artists get a mention, too, from the first human to scratch the outline of an owl onto a cave wall, through Edward Lear (better known for his fanciful poems) to Roger Tory Peterson and David Sibley. But perhaps what comes through more clearly than any one artist is the power birds have to fire our imaginations and compel us to emulate them.

They’d qualify as works of art all by themselves except that they’re not artificial. Birds spring up from forests, prairies, and beaches unbidden, like ladyslippers or snapdragons, straight into our imaginations. From there, it’s just a short flight to the page, the picture frame, and the movie screen.

Like birds themselves, there may be too many bird artists to list all our favorites. John Gwynne has always been one of mine, since my days in Panama looking at Spotted Antbirds and Fiery-billed Aracaris. Other friends at the Lab admire Larry McQueen, Charley Harper, and Ithaca’s own Louis Agassiz Fuertes.

We’ve been lucky to have excellent artists visit us as illustrators and leave behind lasting works. If you’re a member, you may already have some of Evan Barbour‘s artwork on a notepad stuck to your refrigerator. Pedro Fernandes, a recent intern from Portugal, drew a poster full of jays and crows for our Citizen Science programs (some of the images are here), and if you ask me he got their expressions and attitudes just right.

If you enjoy Audubon, you simply must check out a new website at the University of Pittsburgh. The site lets you look at all of the plates from his five-volume Birds of America (more than 400 plates). You can zoom in for incredible resolution (as with the eagle’s head, above) so that you can appreciate Audubon’s attention to even the tiniest feather barbs.

Audubon was so prolific that he’s a little like Mozart: a treasure who is perhaps too well-known to be your favorite. I’m wondering who else I’ve missed. Who is your favorite bird artist?