In our Object Spotlight series, museum curator Heidi Taylor-Caudill takes a closer look at the story behind an object from the collections of John James Audubon State Park Museum. As I look at objects in our collection, I ask myself: what stories can it tell? One of the challenges of being a museum curator is
In 2010, museum consultant and MuseumNext founder Jim Richardson launched #AskACurator Day on Twitter as a fun way to connect the general public and cultural institutions on social media. #AskACurator encourages people to ask curators and other experts questions about their work and the items in their care, with answers posted throughout the day on
In our Recent Research series, curator Heidi Taylor-Caudill shares answers to questions sent to the Audubon Museum about John James Audubon and his family, the museum’s collection, and the history of John James Audubon State Park. A visitor to the museum recently asked us how many original paintings by John James Audubon (1785-1851) are in
In our Audubon’s Story series, museum curator Heidi Taylor-Caudill delves deeper into the histories of the people, places, and events that shaped John James Audubon’s life. The Audubon Museum in Henderson, Kentucky, contains many treasures of Auduboniana (objects related to the life and work of John James Audubon), including a rare, intact, complete set of
In our Recent Research series, curator Heidi Taylor-Caudill shares answers to questions sent to the Audubon Museum about John James Audubon and his family, the museum’s collection, and the history of John James Audubon State Park. In June 2020, we received a question about the provenance (record of ownership) of our copy of John James
Museum Monday videos feature stories from the museum collection and the history of John James Audubon State Park. Join our curator, Heidi Taylor-Caudill, for a new Museum Monday video about the printing of the original double-elephant edition of The Birds of America. Hear the story of John James Audubon and his search for a publisher for the
In our Object Spotlight series, we will take a closer look at the story behind an object from the collections of John James Audubon State Park Museum. One of the rarest books in our museum collection — volume one of the Bien edition of The Birds of America (1858-1860) — represents the financial downfall of
In the Audubon Story series, we will delve deeper into John James Audubon’s history to learn more about the people, places, and events that shaped his life’s course. After viewing the original double-elephant folio prints from The Birds of America in our museum galleries, visitors sometimes ask us, “where is Audubon’s signature?” We’re accustomed today
Museum Monday videos feature stories from the museum collection and the history of John James Audubon State Park. Join our curator, Heidi Taylor-Caudill, for a new Museum Monday video about John James Audubon’s small study of a ruby-throated hummingbird from 1821 in our museum collection. It is an example of Audubon’s early determination to succeed in producing
On April 26, 1785, a young woman named Jeanne Rabin gave birth to a baby boy on his father’s sugar plantation in the French colony of Saint-Domingue (today Haiti). This boy would have been considered a misbegotten child by the standards of Western society in the 18th century. His parents, a French chambermaid and a