John James Audubon

Artist Biography

In 1820, John James Audubon traveled the Mississippi in search of bird specimens that he intended to introduce in a grand art and science book detailing all of the birds of North America. The eventual result was Birds of America, a series containing 435 handcolored life-sized prints. This was accompanied by a five-volume work called Ornithological Biography, a collaboration with Scottish ornithologist William MacGillivray, that contained scientific essays about each of the birds depicted. As a scientist and woodsman, Audubon killed thousands of birds to gain knowledge of their anatomy that he dismembered and then stuffed and painted – a common ornithological practice. His experimentations went so far as to eat some of his specimens remarking on the American white pelican that, “Its flesh is rank, fishy, and nauseous, and therefore quite unfit for food, unless in cases of extreme necessity.” Although his efforts may seem extreme, he was a lover of nature and his work is considered to be the archetype of American bird research and illustration. Today, Audubon’s name is synonymous with conservation and environmental efforts.