Great American Shrike or Butcher Bird
Medium
hand-colored engraving and aquatint on Whatman wove paper
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Mrs. Walter B. James
Accession Number
1945.8.192
Art Historical Context
Behold the *Great American Shrike or Bird* (1834), a stunning hand-colored engraving and aquint by Robert Havell after John James Audubon’s original watercolor. This print captures the fierce shrike—a songbird known as the "butcher bird" for its grisly habit of impaling prey on or barbed wire like a pantry larder—perched dramatically amid a natural vignette of insects and a lizard. Produced on fine Whatman wove paper, it exemplifies the double-elephant folio scale of Audubon’s monumental *The Birds of America* (1827–1838), where birds appear life-sized to convey their vitality. Havell’s maste...
About the Artist
Robert Havell after John James Audubon
Robert Havell Jr., born on November 25, 1793, in Reading, Berkshire, England, was the son of renowned engraver and publisher Robert Havell Sr. and Lydia Miller Phillips. Growing up in a family of artists that included notable engravers and etchers, he trained under his father, mastering aquatint techniques early on. Though briefly estranged from the family business, Havell reconciled with his fath...