A very brief introduction to Katrina van Grouw - August 2010
My apologies for keeping this so brief; more will follow at a later date. My name is now Katrina van Grouw. I used to be Katrina Cook until I married a rather fine Dutchman last year. I am a full-time artist and writer but until very recently I also had a day-job as a bird curator at the Natural History Museum. I’m probably best known for my large drawings of seabird colonies and my drypoints. Sadly the drypoints are no longer possible, as I had to move to a house too small to keep a printing press, but it was probably time to move on anyway. The albatross on my home page was my most successful picture; I now have limited edition, signed giclée prints of it for sale.
I write the regular ‘In the Studio with…’ feature in the new Bird Art and Photography magazine. I also wrote a very big book about the history of bird art through seven centuries, imaginatively entitled ‘Birds’ (not my idea). It’s got Audubon’s flamingo on the front cover. And I do consultancy work and lecturing about the history of natural history art; print techniques used in illustrated books; anything about Audubon; that sort of thing.
At the moment I’m writing and illustrating a book called ‘The Unfeathered Bird’. It’s mostly a collection of detailed pencil drawings of bird skeletons, musculature, plucked skin, windpipes, skulls, feet and tongues of birds from all over the world, but the text is totally readable and devoid of any scientific jargon. It’ll be nice to look at and hopefully quite interesting – useful, even. That’s due out next August and I’m still working round the clock to get it done in time. Have a look at the Unfeathering of the Bird page to find out what it’s like here at the moment.
Do add this website to your favourites as it will be regularly updated with new work and news of forthcoming exhibitions, and feel free to drop me a line with any comments, questions or propsitions.