Rare Opportunity

Rex Brasher, Connecticut's 20th Century Audubon,an exhibition on display in the Dodd Research Center through August 7, offers a rare oppor- tunity to view a large selection of paintings by the man naturalist John Burroughs called "the greatest bird painter of all time." Born in 1869 in Brooklyn, New York, Rex Brasher became passionate about birds at an early age, due to the influence of his father, an avid naturalist and bird taxidermist. In his youth he had heard many times how his father had gone to John James Audubon to discuss birds, only to be snubbed. In 1878, at the age of eight, Brasher determined to paint all the birds of North America from life-and better than Audubon. He started painting birds seriously around age 16, but none of his early paintings has survived. His determination to study birds in their natural surroundings took Brasher to all corners of North America. He financed his first trip, down the east coast from Maine to Florida, by working as a photoengraver. Most of his other trips were financed by betting on horse races. On his trips to the West, Midwest and Gulf Coast, Brasher traveled by train and on foot. Sometimes he walked the countryside for months at a time, stopping along the way to mail home his sketches and notes. Between trips he painted an appartment in New York. His determination to make his bird paintings as lifelike as possible led him twice to destroy all his paintings, a total of at least 700 works. In 1907 Brasher met the famous bird painter, Louis Agassiz Fuertes, who became his good friend and a major influence on his artistic techniques. It was during this time that he learned new techniques for painting feathers that satisfied his artistic standards. In 1911, Rex purchased a 150-acre farm in Kent, Connecticut, calling his new farm Chickadee Valley. There, in 1924, after 47 years of work, he finished his task. His paintings included 1200 species and sub-species of birds listed on the American Ornitholigists Union(AOU) Checklist of North American Birds. Brasher's paintings included more than twice as many birds as Audubon's, who painted 489. He worked from direct observation and portrayed the birds in natural activities and habitats, including associated plants whenever possible. He considered that his 875 paintings, which were placed on exhibition in 1932 in New York City, completed the work begun by Audubon. In 1935, Brasher offered his paintings to the state of Connecticut, providing that a suitable repository could be found for them. Three years later he took the pictures back after various attempts to raise funds for a museum in which to display them had failed. The paintings were then sent to ashington, D. C. to be exhibited as Birds and Trees of North America in the Explorers Hall of the National Geographic Society. Brasher wanted to see his paintings published but discovered that it would be far too expensive to print all of his paintings in color. To solve this problem he had the Meriden Gravure Company make black and white reproductions, which he then hand-colored using stencils and an airbrush. The text was written by his niece Marie and printed by the New Milford Times. The covers were made by a bookbinder on Long Island, and the volumes were assembled in a renovated barn in Chickadee Valley. In all, 100 sets of 12 volumes each were produced, including almost 90,000 hand colored reproductions. In 1941, the State of Connecticut bought the Brasher collection for $74,000, storing it in the basement of the State Capitol in Hartford. Twelve years later, the paintings began to be exhibited in rotation in a large manor house at the Harkness Memorial State Park overlooking Block Island. When decreasing funding at Harkness Memorial made it impractical to continue to exhibit the paintings there a new home was sought for them at the University of Connecticut. Through the efforts of Carl Rettenmeyer, founding director of the Connecticut state museum of Natural History, ownership was transferred to the university, and the collection was deposited in the Homer Babbidge Library. In 1998, the collection was inventoried, stored in acid-free conservation containers, and relocated to the Dodd Research Center in an environment designed to preserve this unique body of work for generations to come. Rex Brasher worked until two years before his death, when his eyesight failed. He died in 1960, at his home in Kent, at the age of 91. His monumental achievement has earned him a permanent place among noted American wildlife illustrators. It is unlikely that anyone will ever again attempt to repeat such a comprehensive series of paintings.

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