Bird Illustrators
The majority of the books in this exhibit were illustrated in some fashion, either by the author or a separate illustrator or photographer whose job it was to provide visual evidence to verify the written word. We feature four illustrators here who had a particular impact in some way on ornithology illustration.
Thomas Bewick. A History of British Birds. Newcastle: Printed by C. H. Cook for R. E. Bewick, 1832.
Click on the image of Bewick to view his illustrations.
As a young boy, Thomas Bewick (1753-1828) showed no promise as a scholar, but he had a natural talent for drawing. At age 14, he was apprenticed to an engraver in Newcastle where he learned to engrave on wood; by the age of 23 he had become a partner in the workshop. In 1790 he published his first natural history book, A General History of Quadrupeds. But it was during Bewick's constant excursions into the English countryside that led him to his best-known work, A History of British Birds, which contains not only beautiful bird illustrations, but many small (and sometimes amusing - see collection of Bewick images by clicking on his portrait above right) pictures of everyday life in rural England.
Bewick is considered a pioneer in the art of wood engravings. He developed a new method for making engravings in which he used harder woods, notably box wood, and carved against the grain using fine tools normally favored by metal engravers. Bewick's method has been the dominant one ever since.
John Gerrard Keulemans (1842-1912)
Click on the image of Keulemans to view his illustrations.
It has been estimated that Dutch bird illustrator J. G. Keulemans produced 4,000-5,000 published illustrations during his long career. After moving to London in 1868, his work appeared regularly in The Ibis and The Proceedings of the Zoological Society. He also illustrated important book birds and was commissioned to paint pictures of birds, many of which are still on display at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Keulemans' work is nothing short of stunning.
Keulemans' work from The Ibis; Biologia Centrali-Americana, vol. 4, "Aves;" and "On the Birds Collected by Professor J. B. Steer in the Philippine Archipelago:" can be seen in this exhibit on the World Birds page. His name is printed in the lower left-hand corner of each illustration.
Frederick William Frohawk (1861-1946)
Click on the image to view Frohawk's illustrations.
As a zoological artist and lepidopterist, Frohawk not only illustrated numerous books by other authors (including Birds' Eggs of the British Isles by Butler), he also wrote and illustrated several books about butterflies.
Charley Harper (1922-2007)
Click on the image to view Harper's illustrations.
Charley Harper was a Cincinnati-based artist known world-wide for his animal drawings in general, but birds in particular. His stylized depictions are readily recognizable. He lent his considerable talents to illustrating Gerald Ames' The Giant Golden Book of Biology (1961), from which a few bird images are featured here.