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Beginnings
John James Audubon was born in Santo Domingo, present-day Haiti, in 1785.
He grew up in France, where his loving stepmother encouraged his interests
in drawing and the outdoors. His father sent him to the United States
in 1803 to avoid Napoleon's draft. Over the next 17 years, Audubon unsuccessfully
wandered from career to career, and place to place.
In 1820 Audubon began his masterpiece, The Birds of
America. From then on, he devoted most of his time to painting birds,
with the intent of printing as engravings life-size portraits of all the
kinds of birds in the United States. |
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Unable
to secure financial backing in the United States, Audubon went to Europe
in 1826. There he found both subscribers and engravers for the project.
The first prints were made that same year.
Over the next twelve years, Audubon divided his time between London and
America. When abroad, he supervised the engraving and coloring of the
prints. In America, he traveled in search of birds to paint.
Audubon returned from England in 1831 to draw new birds for the folio.
His first expedition was to the east coast of Florida to find water birds
and tropical species. George Lehman, a landscape painter, came to do backgrounds
for the bird portraits.
To arrange the Florida expedition, they went to Charleston, South Carolina.
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