Plate 141 I. Goshawk - 2. Stanley Hawk 

Curator: Today we're looking at Plate 141, featuring a goshawk and what Audubon termed the Stanley Hawk. The image is realized as a print, after a drawing. Editor: Immediately striking. The composition uses varied positions—one in flight, the others perched—but I feel a strange flatness. It’s quite stylized despite its seeming realism. Curator: That stylized quality, I believe, is partly born of necessity. Audubon aimed to document all known birds of America and depict them life-size. Note how each hawk displays distinctive plumage. Consider the graphic patterning. Editor: Those varied plumages! It feels like a primer of visual signs for different stages of life, or perhaps even character traits we might associate with hawks: youth, maturity, predator, survivor. The contrast is stark. Curator: I agree. Audubon uses posture to reinforce those distinctions. The goshawk has a piercing gaze; the Stanley Hawk a more contemplative stance. He understood the visual power of detail and dramatic arrangement. Editor: Yes. Even the landscapes are rendered as a theater backdrop. Mountains in the distance seem more about signifying “wilderness” than about geographic specificity. It all comes across as meticulously constructed, a deliberate fiction even as it seeks factual representation. There is great care in defining these symbols. Curator: And in the linear precision of the etching and the added color—which brings us back to Audubon's structural approach. It balances a romantic vision with a clear system of scientific inquiry and artistic method. Editor: This print illuminates the complex interplay between observation, romantic ideals, and the power of visual language. The hawks remain timeless as symbols. Curator: Indeed. These birds become more than mere representations, suggesting a subtle tension between observation and artistic vision.