Collection

The Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum collection began with birds and then took flight to encompass and embrace the art of the natural world. The 1976 inaugural exhibition, Birds of the Lakes, Fields and Forests, set the stage. Today, more than 14,000 works of art, including paintings, drawings and field sketches, graphics, photographs, and sculpture, celebrate the essence and spirit of birds from around the world. The collection also includes decorative arts: more than 125 Victorian glass baskets, early twentieth-century utilitarian and decorative glassware and porcelains, nearly 100 Royal Worcester porcelain bird figurines designed by Dorothy Doughty, and a survey collection of historic and contemporary glass vessel forms and sculptural objects.

See what’s on view from the Museum’s holdings, a treasure trove periodically mined for varied exhibitions from the collection.
Now on View from the Museum’s Collection

Presently, more than 700 artworks from the Museum’s collection can be searched; adding to this database is an ongoing project.
Collection Search

Collection Highlights

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John James Audubon, Pacific Loon, ca. 1834, oil on canvas

James Coe, River Reflections, Fire and Ice, 2011, oil on Belgian linen

Alexander Koester, Ducks and Lily Pads, ca. 1910, oil on canvas

Elwin van der Kolk, Evening Light, 2012, acrylic on hardboard

Andrew Wyeth, Swifts, 1991, watercolor on paper

Andrea Rich, Sandhill Cranes (12/26), 1997, woodcut on Hosho paper

John Whorf, Mallards at Twilight, ca. 1930, watercolor on paper

Martin Johnson Heade, Two Hooded Visorbearer Hummingbirds, ca 1864-65, oil on canvas

Owen J. Gromme, Whistling Swans, ca. 1968, oil on canvas

Robert Bateman, Ghost of the North, 1982, acrylic on hardboard

Frank W. Benson, Black Ducks, 1926, oil on canvas

Eric Conklin, The Brood, 2004, oil on oak panel

Jasper Cropsey, Hazy Afternoon, Autumn, 1873, oil on canvas

Owen J. Gromme, Departure from Lake Katherine, 1977, oil on canvas

John Haberle, A Misunderstanding, 1892, oil on canvas

Ray Harris-Ching, Shoreline, 1991-92, oil on hardboard

Theodore Robinson, Child with Geese, 1886, oil on canvas

George Henry Story, Don’t Count Your Chickens, 1873, oil on canvas

N.C. Wyeth, Port Clyde, ca. 1928, oil on canvas

Larry Barth, Bering Sea Pirates, 1989, acrylic on basswood and tupelo

Rembrandt Bugatti, Walking Ostrich, 1908, bronze

Tim Cherry, Bottoms Up Duck, 2008, bronze

Dorothea Denslow, Nesting Herons, ca. 1940, bronze

Steve Kestrel, Arc of Time, 2010, quartzite riverstone on black slate

Albert Laessle, An Outcast, 1907, bronze

Paul Howard Manship, Owl, 1932, bronze

Ross Matteson, Tundra Swan, 2009, Italian marble

Gene Reineking, Cruising the Breaks, 2009, Buckeye burl

Bart Walter, Blue Grouse, 2010, bronze

John James Audubon, Rose-breasted Grosbeak, ca. 1810, watercolor on pencil on paper

Frank W. Benson, Chickadees, 1938, watercolor on paper

Fidelia Bridges, Birds by the Shore, 1873, watercolor and gouache on paper on board

Don Richard Eckelberry, Squirrel Cuckoo, ca. 1966, watercolor on J. Whatman drawing board

Anne Senechal Faust, This is MY Chicken!, 2005, serigraph on Strathmore paper

Timothy David Mayhew, Frontal Study of Two Chukars on a Branch, 2013, Natural red and white chalk on handmade cotton rag gray woven paper

Terry Miller, I Hear You Singing in the Wires, 2007, pencil on Bristol board

Andrea Rich, Sunflowers and Sparrows, 2005, woodcut on Mulberry paper

Sueellen Ross, Vineyard Visitor, 2003, India ink, watercolor, and colored pencil on Arches paper

Andy Warhol, Rooster, ca. 1957, ink and watercolor on paper

Jamie Wyeth, Feeding Gulls, 1999, mixed media on paper