Audubon, John James

Audubon, John James (1785–1851), born in Haiti, was educated in France, where Rousseau's and Buffon's works led to nature study. After training by David, the French artist, he lived in 1804 on his father's estate near Philadelphia. In the next years he traveled and tried business, portrait painting, drawing instruction, decorating porcelain, taxidermy, and depicting the birds of Kentucky and neighboring wild areas, leading to his The Birds of America (1827–38). His narrative gifts and knowledge of the frontier are better seen in the extracts published as Delineations of American Scenery and Character (1926) and Audubon's America (1940). With the American naturalist John Bachman he worked on Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, completed by his two sons (2 vols., plates, 1842–45; 3 vols., text, 1846–54). He painted many portraits but his fame rests on his bird paintings, whose scientific accuracy may be challenged but whose fresh vitality is unquestioned. His Journal was published in 1929 and his Letters in 1930.