Joel Oppenheimer – författare

John James Audubon is arguably America’s most widely recognized and collected artist. His Birds of America has been reproduced often, beginning with the double elephant folio printed by Havill in England, followed by a much smaller “Octavo” edition printed in Philadelphia and sold by subscription. After Audubon’s death, his family arranged with the New York printer Julius Bien to produce another elephant folio edition, this time by the new chromolithographic process. It too would be sold by subscription, but the venture, begun in 1858, was brought to an abrupt end by the Civil War. Only 150 plates were produced, and the number remaining today is slight; they are among the rarest and most sought after Audubon prints.Bound in cloth with a full cloth slipcase, this beautifully produced book is the first complete reproduction of Bien chromolithographs and will become the centerpiece of any bird lover’s library.

For all the bird lovers, the definitive collection of hummingbird illustrations by 19th-century naturalist painter John Gould, the "British Audubon".This sublime collection of 418 superbly detailed hand-colored lithographs of hummingbirds, created by John Gould, the “British Audubon,” in the mid-1800s, represents all the known species at that time and is the most complete ever produced of hummingbirds. Unlike John James Audubon, whose work focused on the avifauna of a single country, Gould’s folios illustrate species from around the world. His original set of folios—Family of Humming-Birds—reproduced here in its entirety, depicts the magnificent jewel-like birds together with botanicals native to their habitats in the most remote and exotic ecosystems of the Americas.In her essay for the book, co-author Laura Oppenheimer tells the story of Gould’s colorful life and places his work in the context of a remarkable period when exploration and classification of the world’s natural wonders was at the forefront of scientific discovery and universally celebrated in Victorian popular culture. Joel Oppenheimer details how Gould created the prints and presents an overview of nineteenth-century printmaking and lithography techniques. He also unravels the mystery behind the gold-leaf process that Gould employed to portray the iridescent quality of the hummingbirds’ plumage, resolving a long-standing controversy regarding who should be credited for its invention. This Family of Hummingbirds will delight birdwatchers, fans of natural history art, and hummingbird lovers everywhere.

Joel Oppenheimer was a student of Charles Olson at the original Black Mountain College, a fixture in New York’s West Village, and a lover of the NY Mets. His work embraces the taunt line of W. C .Williams. Lessons returns the work of this essential American poet to print.“No one else speaks with his benevolence and humor and still touches me at the depths of my own fear and love. I think his poems are a Godsend to us all.”—Hayden Carruth“Oppenheimer was an immense and buoyant influence on the poesy of my contemporaries and me.”—Andrei CodrescuJoel Oppenheimer (1930 - 1988) published more than a dozen books of poetry.