The Charleston Museum Unveils A Feel Guide to John James Audubon’s Birds of America Exhibition

Press Release

The Charleston Museum, located at 360 Meeting Street in downtown Charleston is pleased to announce a spotlight exhibition, A Feel Guide to John James Audubon’s Birds of America, (1827-1830), Volume I, from February 17th  through April 28th. 

The exhibit presents the latest body of work of visiting poet and cultural ornithologist J. Drew Lanham, which reconsiders with a “head and heart” approach the taxonomy and nomenclature of birds through the intersectional threads of race, place, and nature. Composed of twenty “feel notes” addressed to select Southeastern birds in John James Audubon’s groundbreaking The Birds of America, each poem engages a deeply personal ornithology seeking to move avian identification from the pages of scientific field guides into a cultural “feeling guide,” where words render birds as “who’s” rather than “what’s.”

“Audubon will not disappear, but rather be drawn back into a uniquely prismed ornithology that takes history, current issues, and future possibilities into account,” said J. Drew Lanham, Visiting Poet and Cultural Ornithologist. “This work is an act of arcing head to heart — analytical thinking to evocative feeling — such that in the end, the viewer leaves with adoration, appreciation, but also more questions than answers, about who birds are and what they mean personally and societally.”

“Each week, viewers will have the opportunity to read two new avian “feel notes” presented alongside the corresponding hand-painted Audubon plate from the Museum’s original 1827-1830 edition,” said Kelly S. Turner, Visiting Curator. “By inserting Lanham’s words directly into this visual dialogue, we seek to augment the work of Audubon and frame new conversations and thinking on the appreciation of birds and cultural integration into the history and future of conservation.”

In conjunction with the exhibit, The Charleston Museum will launch the Adopt-an-Audubon Plate Program.  This program will give the public an opportunity to help preserve these extraordinary watercolors ensuring that many generations to come will be able to experience their beauty.  Proceeds will fund binding repairs, paper washing and paper repairs, leather repair, digitization, and a clamshell box for storage which will be completed by the Charleston Library Society’s bindery services.

Opportunities to adopt range from $600 for an individual plate to $3000 for a five-plate set. The conservation of the first five plates of The Birds of America, Volume 1 is supported by The Dewberry Foundation. A complete list of additional works available for conservation can be found here.

Additionally, as The Charleston Museum is recognized as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization by the Internal Revenue Service, gifts to The Museum may be tax deductible. Tax advisors should be consulted for further information. The Adopt-an-Audubon Plate Program is a means to support the Museum’s Archives collections and should in no way be construed as obtaining an ownership interest in these collections. Learn more about Charleston Museum’s exhibits and special events here.

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