Australian ornithologist, artist, and photographer (1932–2020)
Peter Slater (17 October 1932 - 28 May 2020) was an Australian ornithologist, wildlife artist and photographer.
Slater grew up in Western Australia and moved to North Queensland in 1966. He began photographing birds from an early age, has won numerous awards in international exhibitions, and was made an "Artiste" of the "Fédération Internationale de l'Art Photographique" in 1964. He has produced several natural history books and field guides, often in collaboration with his wife Pat or his son Raoul.
In her 2001 book "Feather and Brush", a historical survey of Australian bird painting, Penny Olsen says:
”Naturalist, artist and writer, Peter Slater could be said to be the most modern equivalent of Neville Cayley Jr. Both have published enormously successful field guides to Australian birds, reprinted many times, and both have written on and illustrated butterflies."
"To knowledgeable critics, Slater is now a more accomplished artist than his predecessor. However, this was not yet evident in his early artwork, which includes the plates in "Australian Flycatchers and their Allies", among the first of a new wave of bird identification books. More than any of his contemporaries, he has developed his art in the public eye, chronicled in the many publications containing his work. His rare but successful exhibitions serve to mark stages in his progress and delineate the beginning of new phases in his work. Since 1964, he has illustrated with photographs or paintings, an impressive 30 or more books on birds, and reckons to have painted every Australian bird no less than four times."
Publications.
Books authored or coauthored by Slater, or those featuring his illustrations, include:
References.
Notes.
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