About the artist ...

a conservation illustrator who reserves birds in his drawings

Olin Harris, an artist for the state Department of Natural Resources, has been drawing plants and animals for the better part of 25 years.

So when we were preparing the essay on endangered species for this issue, we called him. We do that often. As always, Olin said, sure, we could look through his stuff and borrow whatever we wanted.

In fact, Olin's "stuff is stacked on tables, propped against walls and crammed into countless expandable cartons.

Olin loves to talk about the art, but not much about himself. This time, though, he let slip that he's hand-printing a collection of his drawings of Illinois birds. Some of them endangered, but not all.

And, once again, he let us borrow a few samples for these two pages.

Olio says his book, tentatively titled An Artist's Book of Birds, will be 32 pages with lithographs — and some hand-colored prints — on fine French printmaking paper. He plans to use Oriental binding and he will include some prose, probably a bit of Henry David Thoreau. But, as with Olin himself, the art will be the central focus.

He's figuring on a dozen or so copies — unless he gets requests — because he's printing them himself. And that involves untold late-night hours. If the books sell, fine, he says. Nevertheless, Olin hasn't even calculated the actual cost of each copy. (So far, we've managed to resist suggesting the economies of mass production and the advantages of modem marketing.)

Peregrine Falcon
Faico peregrinus
Endangered in Illinois and federally

Olin works with pen and ink under a large magnification lamp to create each drawing, using a modified crosshatch that makes the finished product look something like an engraver's etch.

He says while his birds have to be accurate, he's not aiming for scientific. Rather, he's looking for a powerful, realistic impression. He works from mounts or photographs — collecting as many as possible for each bird — then begins with a light pencil base to get the exact shape.

The surface of the drawing is built slowly, creating a high-contrast black and white. All of the lines are nearly the same size, but will reproduce dark or light, depending on the distance between them.

Olin says it takes him an average of 20 to 30 hours to complete each of his originals. This version of the peregrine falcon took him close to 40 hours. Still, he hopes to get his book out by next May.

Olin also created the eagle design for the department's T-shirt series and the new DNR logo. In his spare time, he teaches publication design at the University of Illinois at Springfield, using printmaking to show the relationship of printing to design.

"When you're an artist," he says, "you have to be flexible."

And we're glad of that.

Peggy Boyer Long

16/ December 1995/ Illinois Issues

Great blue Heron
Ardea herodias

Northern Pintail Duck
Anas acuta