The Easel

Archives: Waldemar Januszczak

11th February 2025

I love bird-watching and art. Here’s my gallery guide to doing both at once

In the many years of this newsletter, no-one has ever written about bird-watching and art – until now. Subscribers who are bird-watchers will presumably thrill at this recognition of their hobby. For the rest of us, it’s a chance to learn about the symbolism that birds add to a painting. Goldfinches, with their red colouring, prefigure Jesus’ bloody death. Magpies were thought to be “the bird of death”. And Hieronymus Bosch used owls as a symbol of the Devil. There, birds have added something to your day!