Originally posted to the web in News, on Tuesday, October 24, 2006 6:11 PM CDT.
Audubon exhibit opens at museum
Art is going wild in Wickenburg with a lush exhibition of John James Audubon's “quadrupeds” coming to the Desert Caballeros Western Museum beginning Saturday (Oct. 28).
More than 50 of the explorer artist's hand-colored lithographs of North American animals will be part of a new exhibition titled “The Nature of the Beast.” They will come from their permanent home at the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha, Neb., along with five of the artist's magnificent bird drawings.
“Starting three days before Halloween and extending through New Year's, this is an exhibit that will delight art and animal lovers of all ages,” noted Museum Executive Director Royce Kardinal. “It is a rare treat to see Audubon's animals on exhibit anywhere, let alone in Arizona.”
Born in Haiti and raised in France, John James Audubon (1785-1851) came to America at the age of 18 to escape being conscripted into Napoleon's army. A passionate naturalist as well as an artist, he sought specimens of birds and animals far and wide.
Travels took him, often accompanied by his sons John Woodhouse and Victor, along the Mississippi, the coastal regions of Florida and the East and through Missouri to the Rocky Mountains. Audubon even took “a (1,500-mile) tramp in the Canadas” to seek out far distant North American animals.
Self taught and blessed with seemingly endless energy, the artist would work 12 to 14 hours at a stretch. Audubon usually started an image by outlining it in pencil, then painting over it with watercolor (a favorite medium), oil, pastel, chalk or gouache. Thanks to using layer upon layer of watercolors, the vibrant colors have remained virtually unchanged.
Possessed of a strong will, Audubon labored mightily to get his first effort, “Birds of America,” published. Lugging a 100-pound portfolio of the drawings, he crossed the Atlantic eight times between 1826 and 1838 before he found patrons in England. Fortunately, his work immortalizing animals, “Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America,” found favor on both sides of the Atlantic and was eventually published by a Philadelphia company.
Fifty-four of the quadruped prints will be on display, including many animals that make their
home in the West such as the American wildcat, the prairie wolf and the American bison. Audubon was fascinated by the latter; he regarded the bison as a link to other mammoth-sized American animals and predicted its demise.
“The ‘Quadrupeds' represented a life-long project and one dear to the artist's heart,” said Dr. John Wilson, director of curatorial affairs at the Joslyn Art Museum. “When one understands that it was one of the first scholarly books created by an all-American cast - artist, author, engravers, and publisher - it takes on added and truly patriotic significance. We at the Joslyn are very happy to share these works with our friends in Arizona.”
“The lifelike quality of all the works is a testament to Audubon's artistic imagination as well as to his scientific expertise,” said Mary Ann Igna, curator at the Desert Caballeros Western Museum. “Reaching far beyond anatomical details, habitat and feeding practices, he imbued his subjects with personalities.”
Audubon's dramatic animal and bird prints are complemented by a special section devoted to a charming array of carved birds created by Art Stadler.
A Chicago commercial artist, Stadler moved to Wickenburg in 1952 and purchased the Many Feathers Trading Post. While the entrepreneur enjoyed the shop, his strong artistic instincts prevailed and he started carving birds.
Before long, the artist had assembled an “aviary” and began showing his artful birds in The Wickenburg Gallery and throughout Arizona. Today, at the age of 90, Stadler is regarded as a “national treasure” by family and friends, not to mention bird-lovers.
Special events planned for the Audubon exhibition include a “talk and walk” with famed naturalist and wildlife habitat writer Pinau Merlin, author of “A Field Guide to Desert Holes.” Merlin, who has lived in the desert Southwest for 25 years, leads natural history expeditions in the United States and Mexico, designs wildlife habitat, and writes on a variety of natural history topics.
Her program, “Home is Where the Hole Is,” will get under way at the Museum at 9 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 18, with a walking tour of Wickenburg's Hassayampa River Preserve following. The program is free for Museum and Preserve members and volunteers, and $10 for non-members.
For more information about the Audubon exhibition or the Pinau Merlin program, call 684-2272.
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