Passenger Pigeon.
Hand colored etching by R. Havell, after an original painting by John James Audubon. From John James Audubon’s The Birds of America, [Double elephant folio] vol. 1, (London, 1827), plate 62.
The first edition of Audubon’s monumental work contains 435 plates depicting 1065 figures of 489 species of American birds, in life size, reproduced from Audubon’s paintings. Audubon drew largely from specimens gathered in the field or from skins sent to him by naturalists to create his representations. To reproduce his paintings, the images were copied by means of etching on copper plates (often with additional aquatinting and with occasional engraving) and printed in black ink on “double elephant folio” paper by Robert Havell of London (except for plates I - X, which were editioned by W. H. Lizars of Edinburgh). Once printed, the images were then hand colored with watercolor before being distributed, either in installments to subscribers (in eighty-seven parts of five prints each) or as complete bound copies to the general public.
Approximately 175-200 full sets were published. Of these, 120 complete sets are thought to survive, perhaps seventy of which are located in North America.