Wild Man for A Wild Land

On November 8 an exhibition opening at the West Baton Rouge Museum sets out to illustrate the birth of the American landscape painting tradition and the origins of American conservationism, by introducing the early champions of both.

Wild Land: Thomas Cole and the Birth of American Landscape Painting, a traveling exhibit by the National Endowment for the Humanities, reveals how iconic nineteenth-century artist Thomas Cole simultaneously captured a vision of the American wilderness while pioneering a concept of American environmentalism that continues to shape our national landscape today.

Although Cole painted primarily in the Hudson River Valley and the Catskills of New York, his artistic vision reached south to Louisiana in profound ways, influencing the development of the Bayou School and another artist deeply connected with Louisiana and the early stirrings of American environmentalism—John James Audubon. Cole and Audubon were contemporaries, and together they represent some of the most influential early chroniclers of America’s wilderness.

To breathe life into this relationship, the museum is bringing award-winning historical re-enactor Brian “Fox” Ellis to West Baton Rouge. Ellis, a full-time storyteller who has portrayed John James Audubon professionally for twelve years, will channel the spirit of the artist/naturalist to illustrate not just the art, but also the science and fascination with birds, that are equal parts of Audubon’s legacy.

On November 15, Ellis will reenact Audubon while leading an immersive bird walk through the grounds of Oakley Plantation in St. Francisville, where the artist lived, worked and painted in 1821. He will then address the artistic connections between Audubon, Cole, and the development of American environmental thought at the West Baton Rouge Museum that afternoon. We caught up with Ellis by phone at his home in Bishop Hill, Illinois, to find out what he has in store.

“Of all the characters I portray, John James Audubon is the most popular,” said Ellis, noting that he re-enacts the artist/naturalist as many as one hundred times a year. “As a lifelong birder and former biology teacher, I’ve come to Audubon with a fascination for how art and literature give us a chance to immerse ourselves in history. Everybody knows his art. What few know is that he was also a best-selling author. Audubon published fifty stories and two thousand pages about his travels through North America. That gives me great material to work with.

 “I believe Audubon was the first man of American letters who articulated an American environmental ethic,” Ellis noted. “He traveled the wilderness in the eighteen-teens. He wrote about seeing a flock of passenger pigeons that numbered one billion, two hundred million birds. Then by the 1830s and ‘40s he saw those flocks diminishing. He saw the deforestation and he wrote about it. He was one hundred years ahead of his time.”

On November 15, Ellis will portray Audubon-the-birding-enthusiast at St. Francisville’s Oakley during the morning and Audubon-the-artist at the West Baton Rouge Museum in the afternoon. The common thread in Ellis’ presentations: Audubon-the-showman.

“Some people say Mark Twain was the first to create a persona to sell his art,” said Ellis, in a convincing French-accented English dialect. “But Audubon did that fifty years earlier. On stage he was a vivacious and colorful storyteller who was keenly aware of the importance of selling to his audience. He has roots in French aristocracy, but he dressed as an American woodsman. He toured Europe in buckskin and bear grease, telling wild stories of bear-hunting expeditions with Indians and going squirrel hunting with Daniel Boone.”

Birds, bears, and buckskin: If that sounds like a good way to get acquainted with the history of American art, put one or both of Ellis’s programs on your calendar. The Audubon bird walk begins at 9 am on Saturday, November 15 at Audubon State Historic Site, 11788 Hwy 965 in St. Francisville. The afternoon program begins at 2:30 pm at the West Baton Rouge Museum, 845 North Jefferson Avenue in Port Allen. Admission to both is free, and all are welcome. For more information on the exhibit, visit westbatonrougemuseum.org.