Birds in Art

When I grew up I lived on a hill in Colorado Springs in an area called the bird farm.  I lived on Robin Drive and attended Audubon Elementary School.

John James Audubon was a wildlife artist who painted the birds of America.  He lived from 1785 to1851.  His works can be found in Birds of America which includes 435 prints of Audubon's paintings of birds. The Audubon Society was established in the late 1800s and has contributed untold efforts to establish bird conservation in America.

James discovered, by banding birds, that birds returned to the very same nesting sites each year.

Did you know that Wolfgang Mozart owned a European Starling?  He owned the Starling for three years and when it died Mozart conducted a funeral and read a poem that he wrote about his Starling.

You may have heard of Tory Peterson, even if you are not a birder.  He is the publisher of many field guides which are used by many beginner as well as more advanced birdwatchers. They are illustrated by bird paintings rather than photographs. His website offers Birding Podcasts with Species Profiles which include their songs. It is acceptable to "list" a bird that you can identify by sound alone even if you have not seen the bird. Peterson has had two nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize and is credited with starting the environmental movement. Unfortunately, he died in 1996 but his organization lives on.

Another bird illustrator who is still living and also writes field guides is David Sibley.  You may have heard of him as he is well known.

Are you old enough to have seen the movie The Birds. It was produced by Alfred Hitchcock in 1963 and left many people with a fear of birds.  It was based on real events that took place on Monterey Bay, CA in 1961 when disoriented and dying seabirds flew into homes in the area. At the time this was a complete mystery but now they think that the bird's behavior was created by eating toxins in algae which poisoned them.

Landsdown has published several books filled with his bird art.  They include Birds of the Eastern Forest (Volumes I and II), Birds of the Northern Forest (Volumes I and II), Birds of the West Coast (Volumes I and II), Rails of the World and more.

He has a reputation as one of the world's greatest bird painters.  His portraits included birds of prey, waterfowl, woodpeckers, swallows and more. He lived from 1937 to 2008.

Louis Agassiz Fuertes was an American bird artist born in 1874 in Ithaca, NY and died in 1927. He attended Cornell University. He created watercolors of both birds and mammals. His illustrations are very accurate and much sought after.