about one foot tall -Walnut mounted on Red Cedar with Walnut base
April 1983 - sold that same month at the TAL gallery
Beginning in 1983, I made about a dozen song birds of different kinds. Most were natural wood colors and did not protray any real species since real bird species aren't usually the color of wood. I would either use a generic species name like wren or make up a name like buff crowned chickadee or purple nuthatch. After a while I decided I would like to protray real species which required painting to be accurate. I made a couple of Bluebird carvings but did not enjoy the painting part of the process and did not feel I was apt to become as good at it as others already doing the same thing.
Will I use song birds as subject matter again? It's hard to say. I like the natural color of wood. I also like to protray the thing I'm protraying as accurately as possible. That presents me with a catch 22 regarding song birds but life wasn't meant to be easy.