Arader Galleries is pleased to be presenting frequent auction opportunities featuring a wide variety of our exceptional inventory. Specializing in Natural History, Maps and Views, Furniture, Globes, originals and prints. Our auctions are perpetually revolving and bringing clients the finest works for fantastic prices. On February 28, Arader Galleries in conjunction with Mid-Hudson Auction Galleries will be hosting another auction. This particular event will feature an exceptional array of John James Audubon's finest Quadrupeds.
In the
1830s, as the final plates were being completed for John James Audubon's
monumental Birds of America series, the artist began to gather material
for his second and equally ambitious undertaking. Planning to complete
the definitive study of American wildlife, Audubon set out to document
the animals of North America, and to present them in a format as
impressive and sweeping as that he used for his birds. The result of
the artist/naturalist's years of field research, travel, and seemingly
endless study was the Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, the
outstanding work on American animals produced in the nineteenth
century.
Audubon envisioned that his Quadrupeds
would complete his record of the animal life of North America. The
artist's enthusiasm at the start of the Quadrupeds was unbounded. In
1840, Audubon wrote to his friend and collaborator John Bachman, “I am
growing old, but what of this? My spirits are as enthusiastical as ever,
my legs fully able to carry my body for ten years to come…Only think of
the quadrupeds of America being presented to the World of Science by
Audubon and Bachman.”
Despite his newly acquired
wealth and celebrity, Audubon insisted on executing many of the
preparatory drawings and watercolors personally, enlisting a select few
to help. The contributors to the project included the Reverand Dr. John
Bachman, a Lutheran minister who had been the artist's closest friend
and supporter for many years, who wrote all of the descriptions and
acted as a scientific editor for the work. Audubon's two sons, John
Woodhouse and Victor, also took critical roles, with John Woodhouse
providing portraits and Victor working on the backgrounds. With his
sons, Audubon traveled through the Eastern woodlands, and through
Missouri to the Rocky Mountains. Together they collected and drew
specimens along the Mississippi, as well as in coastal regions of
Florida and the East Coast.
As Audubon's health and
eyesight began to fail, the help of John Woodhouse and Victor became
increasingly crucial to the Quadrupeds, now a family project. Audubon
managed to complete seventy seven drawings before failing health kept
him from his work. Before he died in 1851, Audubon's sons managed to
solicit some three hundred subscriptions for the Quadrupeds. Together,
the three men, along with John Bachman, produced an unequaled record of
American wildlife, matching the great combination of art and science
attained in the Birds of America. Audubon’s Quadrupeds are wonderfully
animated, superbly rendered, and beautifully printed in large format.
The
work was published by a respected Philidelphia-based printing house
under J.T. Bowen. Bowen used a newly developed technique of steel
lithography, and hand colored each plate with remarkable consistency.
A
fine selection of the Quadrupeds of North America, as well as his
revered Birds of America are currently on display at Arader Galleries
San Francisco. Please stop by our gallery at 432 Jackson Street to view
these masterpieces and pick up a copy of your auction catalog today. You
can also download the PDF HERE.
