Nature, Biology & Life Sciences, Birds, Zoology, Types of Art, Graphic Arts & Book Design - History, Art by Subjects, Natural History

The Unfeathered Bird

Name: The Unfeathered Bird
Author: Katrina van Grouw
ISBN: 9780691151342

by Katrina van Grouw

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Overview

There is more to a bird than simply feathers. And just because birds evolved from a single flying ancestor doesn't mean they are structurally all the same. With over 385 stunning drawings depicting 200 species, The Unfeathered Bird is a richly illustrated book on bird anatomy that offers refreshingly original insights into what goes on beneath the feathered surface. Each exquisite drawing is made from an actual specimen and reproduced in sumptuous large format. The birds are shown in lifelike positions and engaged in behavior typical of the species: an underwater view of the skeleton of a swimming loon, the musculature of a porpoising penguin, and an unfeathered sparrowhawk plucking its prey. Jargon-free and easily accessible to any reader, the lively text relates birds' anatomy to their lifestyle and evolution, examining such questions as why penguins are bigger than auks, whether harrier hawks really have double-jointed legs, and the difference between wing claws and wing spurs. A landmark in popular bird books, The Unfeathered Bird is a must for anyone who appreciates birds or bird art.

A unique book that bridges art, science, and history
Over 385 beautiful drawings, artistically arranged in a sumptuous large-format book
Accessible, jargon-free text--the only book on bird anatomy aimed at the general reader
Drawings and text all based on actual bird specimens
Includes most anatomically distinct bird groups
Many species never illustrated before

Synopsis

A richly illustrated look at bird anatomy

There is more to a bird than simply feathers. And just because birds evolved from a single flying ancestor doesn't mean they are structurally all the same. With over 385 stunning drawings depicting 200 species, The Unfeathered Bird is a richly illustrated book on bird anatomy that offers refreshingly original insights into what goes on beneath the feathered surface. Each exquisite drawing is made from an actual specimen and reproduced in sumptuous large format. The birds are shown in lifelike positions and engaged in behavior typical of the species: an underwater view of the skeleton of a swimming loon, the musculature of a porpoising penguin, and an unfeathered sparrowhawk plucking its prey. Jargon-free and easily accessible to any reader, the lively text relates birds' anatomy to their lifestyle and evolution, examining such questions as why penguins are bigger than auks, whether harrier hawks really have double-jointed legs, and the difference between wing claws and wing spurs. A landmark in popular bird books, The Unfeathered Bird is a must for anyone who appreciates birds or bird art.

A unique book that bridges art, science, and historyOver 385 beautiful drawings, artistically arranged in a sumptuous large-format bookAccessible, jargon-free text—the only book on bird anatomy aimed at the general readerDrawings and text all based on actual bird specimensIncludes most anatomically distinct bird groupsMany species never illustrated before

About the Author, Katrina van Grouw

Katrina van Grouw is a former curator of the ornithological collections at London's Natural History Museum, a taxidermist, an experienced bird bander, a successful fine artist, and a graduate of the Royal College of Art. She is the author of "Birds", a historical retrospective of bird art, published under her maiden name Katrina Cook. The creation of "The Unfeathered Bird" has been her lifetime's ambition.

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Editorials

Scientist

The 300+ drawings—of skinned birds, their muscular and skeletal anatomy exposed in lifelike poses—are extraordinary, a sort of 2-D bird 'Body Worlds.'. . . [The text is] lucid, colloquial, packed with information, and leavened with humor, it brings a grasp of bird evolution and adaptation within any reader's reach. . . . A magnificent—and accessible—monograph on biodiversity.
— Annie Gottlieb

Nature

Van Grouw's focus on the skeleton rather than on external appearance gives the book a special power. Van Grouw's book was 25 years in the making: surprisingly quick, considering the work involved. An international list of friends, colleagues, farmers, conservationists—and the occasional taxidermist—donated dead birds for her (and her taxidermist husband) to pluck, skin and boil down to their skeletons. And draw—exquisitely.
— Alison Abbott

Fatbirder

This fusion of art and science is a fascinating coffee table book that boosts that genre to another level. It invites you to browse but then catches your interest and when I intended to look through it as if waiting for the coffee to arrive I found myself slowing up to read about how the environmental niche needs skeletal variation and what makes for diving and what merely submerging. Pre-DNA taxonomy has relied on skeletal differences to reveal the phylogenetic tree so this look beneath the skin is not mere curiosity but science with a capital 'S'. On the other hand there is a beauty on the form. I've always loved scientific drawings whether of birds or botanical specimens as there is not just science in their accuracy but beauty too.
— Bo Beolens

Birdbooker Report

This coffee-table book would make a good gift for someone with an interest in bird or anatomy art.
— Ian Paulsen

Guardian

Gives us genuinely new insights into the behaviour of living species.
— Stephen Moss

Nature

Van Grouw's focus on the skeleton rather than on external appearance gives the book a special power. Van Grouw's book was 25 years in the making: surprisingly quick, considering the work involved. An international list of friends, colleagues, farmers, conservationists--and the occasional taxidermist--donated dead birds for her (and her taxidermist husband) to pluck, skin and boil down to their skeletons. And draw--exquisitely.

Scientist

The 300+ drawings--of skinned birds, their muscular and skeletal anatomy exposed in lifelike poses--are extraordinary, a sort of 2-D bird 'Body Worlds.'. . . [The text is] lucid, colloquial, packed with information, and leavened with humor, it brings a grasp of bird evolution and adaptation within any reader's reach. . . . A magnificent--and accessible--monograph on biodiversity.

Fatbirder

Birdbooker Report

This coffee-table book would make a good gift for someone with an interest in bird or anatomy art.

Guardian

Gives us genuinely new insights into the behaviour of living species.

Well-Read Naturalist

Katrina van Grouw's new book The Unfeathered Bird from Princeton University Press is likely to be one of the most desired books on gift lists this holiday season. This exquisitely illustrated study of bird anatomy is captivating in both its insight and its originality of illustration from the very first page.

Another Bird Blog

[H]ere is a book with a wide appeal, a book which deserves to be studied by birders with a scientific and/or artistic bent, ornithologists, bird artists, bird photographers, biologists, natural historians, and artists of all persuasions. The author states that the original intention was a book aimed at artists and it was only during the early stages that she realized it could have wider appeal. In my opinion it was a realization which has come to fruition in a beautifully crafted, scholarly and ultimately fine book . . .

Discover Magazine

Haunting, stunning, a schooling for any other scientific illustrator out there. Illustrations that go beneath the feathered surface of birds and explore how their internal anatomy functions in different settings--one impressively underwater--is a scientific feat in itself. Truly challenges the idea that art is separate from scientific inquiry.

Palaeosam's Blog

I challenge any reader to walk away from this book without being blown away by the remarkable and diverse nature of birds. Just when you think you have seen every trick Avian Anatomy has to throw at you, you turn the page and are greeted by the windpipe of Phonygammus keraudrenii (the Trumpet Manucode) or the tongue of Picus viridis (the Green Woodpecker).

Minneapolis Star Tribune

Turning each page [is] an adventure. Particularly welcome is the large size with which many images are so boldly presented. . . . It's early in the year, but I doubt if 2013 will see a book published that is more interesting or fascinating or better done than Ms. van Grouw's. It is $49.95, worth every penny, a world-wide birding expedition like no other.

Smithsonian Magazine

A work of passion. . . . [Katrina van Grouw] has used her experience in ornithology and taxidermy to draw, over the course of her career, 385 beautiful illustrations of birds--all, as the book's title suggests, without their feathers. Her work shows the skeletal and muscular systems of 200 different species, from ostriches to hummingbirds, parrots to penguins, in life-like poses.

BBC Wildlife Magazine

Part of the strength of this anatomical extravaganza is its breadth, spanning the entire range of birds from primping parrots to posturing penguins, all in lifelike poses. Every image is arresting, but several--like the great cormorant, grey heron and rook--are so vibrant that they seem to fly off the page.

Audubon Magazine

The Unfeathered Bird is a treasure trove of 585 stunning anatomical drawings of 200 bird species in various states of undress. [Van Grouw] offers beautiful, enlightening illustrations of musculature and details of eyes, orbits, bills, ears, feet, skulls, wings, tongues, bones. Her drawings would be sufficient by themselves, but Ms. Von Grouw has also provided a thorough, accurate, and accessible text which further explains anatomical details and evolutionary relationships. There is nothing in the literature of birds or bird art that is anything like The Unfeathered Bird. Anyone who loves birds and bird art will want this volume.

Caught by the River

Katrina van Grouw's book The Unfeathered Bird is a unique wonder that has joined the bird book firmament and as soon as I saw it I recognized it to be a monumental achievement.

A Charm of Finches

If you are a birder with an interest in how birds do what they do, this is an excellent book. . . . This would also make a great gift for a birding friend who seems to have every bird book in print.

Examiner

While it's tempting to say that The Unfeathered Bird reduces birding to its bare bones, and, indeed it is full of detailed drawings of the skeletal structures of birds as well as the musculature and other layers normally obscured by feathers, van Grouw does not give us just a bare bones look at birds. She fleshes out and feathers a wide variety of bird species with rich detail of their behavior, anatomy, and evolutionary adaptations.

Science

Although her detailed drawings of bones, skeletons, muscles, and other internal tissues would not be out of place in a treatise on avian anatomy, van Grouw intends them to reveal how birds' 'appearance, posture, and behavior influence, and are influenced by, their internal structure.'

Birding is Fun!

Van Grouw's text describing what she's showing in the artwork is equally wonderful and enlightening. The Unfeathered Bird reveals things about birds that you may never have imagined, like the coiled wind-pipe of the Trumpet Manucode. Amazing!

Brain Pickings

An illuminating and meticulously illustrated look at the brilliance of birds at the intersection of art, science and history, covering such intricate mysteries as how the ostrich lost two of its four toes and why the vulture diverged into radically different Old World and New World varieties. . . . Meticulously researched, gloriously illustrated, and absorbingly narrated, The Unfeathered Bird lives at the heart of that timeless temple where art and science meet to enrich one another with 'systematic wonder.'

Prairie Ice

This is a book that everyone interested in birds should own and in particular, every bird painter, sculptor, and carver should be required to have this book and study it well. Overall the level of detail in the text is well matched with the artwork resulting in a comprehensive whole that I think meets the authors goal of making this book a well done 'convergence of art and science; accessibility and erudition; old and new--without compromise and without apology.'

New York Times

Unsettling and irresistible. . . . [The birds] are drawn and described in the text, with great skill and attention to the details--of their structure, their evolution and their lives--and with a slightly wicked sense of humor that appears often enough to lift the book beyond another compendium of bird life. . . . This is a coffee-table book, and compelling images are enough to sell such a volume, but The Unfeathered Bird delivers on the other promise of such books, not always fulfilled, that there should be something to read. . . . [I]f you love the natural world for its astonishments, for something as obvious but thrilling as the huge variety of shapes that birds and their parts have evolved, then The Unfeathered Bird won't disappoint.

Birder's Library

The Unfeathered Bird is visually arresting and utterly unique. But I had been expecting that. What really surprised me is how much I loved reading it. It's fascinating, relevant, and will deepen your appreciation for these amazing creatures.

Flying Mullet

A one-of-a-kind book. . . . This book is like a marriage of a technical ornithology book and an artist's portfolio but even better because the text reads in an entertaining fashion for anyone that is interested in birds.

Science Visualization

In a world where traditional science illustration is dying and being replaced by digital and other technologies, it's nice to see someone who has not succumbed--who still uses pencils and paintbrushes to create illustrations that are not only informative, but rise to the level of fine art. . . . The Unfeathered Bird deserves its place in the center of the coffee table: not only a must-have for the libraries of science artists, but as a classic for all lovers of natural history.

Birdwatch

This acts as both a fine reference and an expert artist's portfolio. It is an original work by a prodigiously talented bird artist . . . it deserves to be widely admired.

Naturalist's Journal, Standard-Times

This magnificent volume will not only delight your eyes, it will change the way you see the natural world.

New Scientist

A text spiked with quirky humour and replete with arcane bird lore and nuggets of natural history. . . . Monumentally impressive, 25 years in the making, The Unfeathered Bird is simply superb.