Martin Johnson Heade's The Gems of Brazil : Hummingbird Paintings and the Feather Industry"

In this talk, Dr. Francesca Soriano reinterprets Martin Johnson Heade's paintings of hummingbirds in the context of the nineteenth century feather and bird trade. Considering himself a 'monomaniac on hummingbirds,' Heade first came to the subject after a trip to Brazil in 1863, when he embarked on a project titled The Gems of Brazil, a chromolithographic album of the birds in tropical landscapes.

This program is part of The Art of Birds: Avians as Symbols, Stewards, and Storytellers series.