William T Cooper: The great bird artist's legacy to NSW
Submitted by Chickowee on 18 Sep 2017.
As a teenager of 16, Cooper showed signs of the career that would give him international recognition - when he drew birds in their natural environment, Cooper took care to add the name of the species, the location and the date. A sweet watercolour of a little grebe from that time is among thousands of Cooper's drawings that were given to the State Library of NSW this year by Mrs Cooper.
The charitable, tax-deductible gift also includes his entire professional work, including more than 2000 of his working sketches, often in pencil and partly painted with watercolours, as well as his field diaries and letters.
