BIRDS IN ART 2025

On 3-7th September 2025 I attended the opening festivities of the 50th Birds in Art exhibition at the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum in Wausau, WI. A privilege to meet so many nice folks from all around and I had a wonderful time! My painting of a young Wandering Albatross was among the 102 artworks selected for display this year and it is now also part of the museum's permanent collection.
THE ROARING FOURTIES

In January 2025 I went on a seven day cruise from Durban to Marion & Prince Edward islands, South Africa. Being my first true pelagic trip as well as first visit to the Southern Hemisphere this week with minimal sleep was mind blowing to say the least. The feeling of waking up in a crispy cold seascape surrounded by hundreds of albatrosses of different species along with many other seabirds and mammals was surreal. Add to that the company of nearly two thousand keen birdwatchers and nature lovers from all over the globe and you have the recipe for an unforgettable experience! Only mishap was my fail to get grips on the many but incredibly elusive penguins on our days around the islands, but that's another story... 

For the first time all three names behind the book Seabirds – The New Identification Guide were assembled: Peter Harrison MBE (keynote speaker), Prof. Martin Perrow (lecturer/bird guide onboard) and yours truly (bird guide onboard). Peter gave two lectures on albatrosses and his life story respectively, the latter became very emotional for all three of us as we got cheers and applause from the audience at the end of the talk – what a wonderful and warm recognition after so much hard labour. Another great moment was the book signing event which was well-attended. So happy that so many people brought that heavy brick of a book along for this occasion. Great thanks to Peter Harrison & Shirley Metz for the invitation to join and Birdlife South Africa with CEO Mark Anderson and everyone in the wonderful staff for making it all happen! Read about the campaign to save the seabirds on Marion here.

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A NOVEMBER WEEKEND IN STOCKHOLM

On November 16-17 2024 I was in Stockholm to open a small Christmas exhibition at Swarovski Optik Campex on Kungliga Djurgården. I also took the opportunity to talk about gull identification, both in the field and as a lecture, and I demonstrated how a watercolor is made in front of the audience. Many thanks to everyone who came by, at times it was quite crowded inside Swarovski's premises!