Cover Birds is a fully illustrated autobiography by renowned artist and respected ornithologist Robert Gillmor. Robert’s love of all things avian began in 1948, when he joined the Reading Ornithological Club (ROC) aged just 11. A few years later, he was introduced to lino-cutting by his art master at school, and his prints of birdlife (from Canada Geese to Black-throated Divers) have been illustrating the Club’s report covers ever since.
Illustrated with Robert’s artwork throughout, this is a beguiling account of one man’s development, over 60 years, as both artist and bird-lover.
Robert Gillmor is the vice-president of the Society of Wildlife Artists (SWLA). A keen ornithologist, he has served all three of the national organisations: the RSPB, British Ornithologists’ Union and the British Trust for Ornithology. In 2011 he was commissioned by Royal Mail to produce four special-edition series of stamps featuring British garden birds; the artwork was brought together in the hugely successful Birds, Blocks & Stamps (Two Rivers, 2011; ISBN 9781901677799), three times reprinted. He lives in Reading.