Birds: The Art of Ornithology (Rizzoli Classics) Hardcover – February 17, 2015

A stunning overal view of the art of drawing birds . The main part of the wide and rich collection of artists and the colored bird plates is from the collection of the Natural History Museum in London . It starts with the quite beautiful drawing of a Great Spotted Woodpecker of Pieter Holsteyn the elder , includes Eleazar Albin with the Poole snipe ( Female Ruff ) , a finely drawn bird and wanders trough the ages , showing quite clearly how bird-drawing has evolved , with short biographies of the artists who made these portraits . The book missed out on some of my personal favorites( no Louis Agassiz Fuertes ) but showed me some other delightful and to me quite new drawings like the Secretary bird of John Latham on page 67 and the quite stunning work of Joseph Wolf . There is a nice collection of the work of Sarah Stone , a female orthinologist of note and of William MacGillivray writer of ' A history of British Birds ' with his impressive Grey Heron p 147 . The book has four big chapters : Engravers and explorers : 1650 to 1800 , then Audubon to the first lithographers : 1800 to 1850 ,with among many others the remarkable work of the Indian artist Khuleelooddeen wo worked in gouache , something I would like to try myself one day . Then : The Golden age of Lithography : 1850 to 1890 and the last : An Age of Transition : 1890 to today . The Golden age shows some very fine drawings like the South American Painted Snipe by the hand of Elizabeth Gould , one of my favorite bird -artists and of John Gould . There are also some remarkable examples from several collections by anonymous artists . The last chapter , An Age of Transition ,shows the beginning of the use of photographs to capture the birds while they are alive and moving ; this gives artists a whole new way of showing birds in the environment they live in . To my mind , this part of the book should have shown more contemporary artists . The field is wide , granted and it is difficult to choose , but there is only one artist mention from later than 1920 , namely Angela Gladwell with a lively Kakapo from 1998 . This is also the only criticism I have on the book . However , maybe the writer means to write a second book with modern works , coupled with the same bird drawn by an artist from the Golden age ? That would be really great .

Shows a variety of birds painted by different bird artists. Some of the illustrations are very small and I am not sure how good the color is. I gave it 4 stars because the book does discuss painters of birds who I would never have known. Still I wish the illustrations were better.

I was amaze that the book barely mentioned Alexander Wilson or Louis Agassiz Fuertes, and had none of their works. Fuertes is arguably one of the masters, and Wilson’s place in history is well earned.

Simply gorgeous. One of my favorite purchases of the year.

No trajo carátula

Beautiful book. Just perfect for my coffee table in Florida. I plan to give this as a gift in the future

My friends son loves it & they are using it for home schooling

Beautiful book with lovely illustrations of birds

É um livro de arte. Precisa dizer mais alguma coisa?

Quem aprecia ilustrações em diversas técnicas de pintura, de aves, através de autores de um período temporal bem amplo, vai adorar esse livro.Lindas ilustrações de alta qualidade que servem de aprendizado para os que apreciam a arte do desenho de aves.

Beautiful book!

Wunderschöne Bilder! Ideal als Zeichen- oder Malvorlagen, aber auch für den, der es nur durchblättert, sehr schön und bereichernd! Sehr gute Qualität.