Owls are fascinating creatures and I have enjoyed studying and teaching about them during my career.
Conservation was a key learning outcome of the vertebrate management class I taught. This photo was taken during one of the many visits to the class from Zoo to You. I wanted the students to see the animals up close and in person while discussing their biology and roles in the environment. Owls were a favorite, especially barn owls, because they are so important in rodent control. Everything about their anatomy is exquisitely adapted for hunting on the wing at night; a marvel of evolution.
In the evenings, especially warm summer nights with the windows are open, I listen for barn owls, waiting to hear their screeches and clicks. There’s only been a few times in my life that I’ve caught a glimpse of a ghostly specter, swift and silent, crossing the night sky. They are there, but rarely do you get to encounter them in their habitat.
I admire and respect barn owls, and my attempts to draw them have been excruciatingly disappointing. Add in the goal of donating a print to the Ojai Raptor Center's fundraising auction, and my personal expectations for quality only increased. The proportions had to be just right - I had to respect the anatomical geometry and the eons of adaptive sculpturing that created such a unique face. I was so dissatisfied with my two first attempts, embarrassed really.
But then one morning, I woke up with an image in my head: the body hidden, the face peering out from a roost high in a barn, eyes gazing out, taking in the landscape. Hidden, asymmetric ears listening for little scurries in the weeds below.
I finished breakfast, took my cup of dragon pearl jasmine tea to the desk and tucked into putting graphite on paper. Six hours later she was done. Prudence.
I don’t fully understand it. I don’t understand my own creative process. Nothing like that has happened before, but it was beautiful and I still get a chill when I look at her. And I’m not ready to part with the original.
After the auction has ended, prints of Prudence will be added here to the Bird Collection, but I’m keeping the original at home for now. Perhaps I'll do another barn owl in the near future.
