biography
| name: |
Audubon, John James
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| |
originally Jean Jacques Fougere
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pronunciation:
[awduhbon]
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1785–1851)
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| biography:
| Painter and naturalist, born in Les Cayes, Haiti. The illegitimate son of a French sea captain and merchant, Jean Audubon, and a Creole woman, he was taken to France and legally adopted by Audubon and his wife (1794). He began drawing birds as a teenager (but few now accept his claim that he studied under David in Paris). In 1803 he moved to his father's estate near Philadelphia, where he spent his time hunting, experimenting with birds (he is credited with the first ringing of wild birds in America), and drawing the birds he hunted. After convincing her father that he could support her, he married Lucy Bakewell (1808), but soon he was going bankrupt, operating stores and other business enterprises in Kentucky while he pursued his passions of observing and drawing wildlife. To make his finished paintings, for which he used a mix of pastel, watercolour, tempera and (later) oils, he would shoot or trap birds and other wildlife (or buy dead specimens in the market) and set them in lifelike poses by passing wires through them. He moved to New Orleans (1821), and Lucy was soon providing much of their income by tutoring, while her husband contributed some by doing portraits and teaching art. Determined to publish his bird paintings in a large format, he was advised to go to Europe to find skilled engravers, and went to Britain (1826) where, in addition to lining up customers, he eventually obtained the help of master engraver Robert Havell, Jr. The great ‘double elephant’ folio edition of The Birds of America (4 vols, 1827–38), with hand-coloured engravings, enjoyed immediate success; the text was published separately (5 vols, 1831–9) as Ornithological Biography. He returned to America (1829–30, 1831–4) to continue his search for every species of bird he could find. He went back to Europe (1834–9), then settled permanently in the USA. He issued a smaller edition of The Birds of America (1840–4), and with the naturalist John Bachman worked almost until his death on The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America (3 vols, 1845–54). Although criticized for certain scientific and artistic failings, Audubon's work still engages people with its dramatic and detailed images of wildlife. |
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