My brother lives out West in Seattle. Whenever I’ve been able to visit, I’m fascinated with birds that are similar to those we have in the East; the Stellar’s Jay compared with the Blue Jay and the Mountain Chickadee (represented with this piece) and the Black-capped Chickadee to name two. The evolutionary progression is down right facscinating when you think about these coming each from a single genetic base.
I could go on and on, but this is more about the map I used and less about the bird. I’m in progress with a trio of different Chickadee’s that are found in the Northwest; Mountain, Boreal and Black-capped. Here in the East we have Black-Capped and Carolina Chickadees. They are favorite subject. Whenever I focus on a bird, I start a search for a map. Recently, historical topographic maps have been a favorite. A nicely aged topographic map has wonderful colors that can provide a great counterpoint for a bird.
Historically, topographic maps were compiled, drawn and edited by hand from direct observation. If you think about it, that was an artform unto itself. Some maps had a wash of color applied, but others were plain with colors added by time thru the aging process. It’s these gems I like to find.
The map this Mountain Chickadee was painted on is a map of Colville, Washington from 1933. It had a wash of green applied to the paper with contour lines in an oxide red and waterways in a blue. Colville is on the Columbia River and is right along a the western edge of the Mountain Chickadee range. The colors were perfect, but just needed enhancement. I loaded the PDF file into Photoshop and boosted the vibrance/saturation and tinkered a little with the color balance. When I was satisfied, the image was passed thru an oil paint filter that enhanced the flow of terrain, but also obfuscated place names to a degree. This obfuscation may prove beneficial with maps that have distasteful or disrespectful place names. It’s an effect I plan on using in the future. I printed the map and mounted the map to a hardbord panel.
Here’s Mountain Chickadee – Columbia River. It’s a small piece coming in at 5 X 7 and was done in acyrlic.
