Rookery for Two 2015

The 2015 Annual Chesapeake Poster


Rookery is a nesting site for many heron’s nests.

So don’t be misled. It’s not just one lone nest as pictured here.

But, I love that word, rookery.

It sounds old-fashioned like chancery or crockery.

So, Rookery for Two, is a perfect example of an artist taking license.

I was shown a rookery once.

I was led down into a deep muddy wet jungle-like ravine on the eastern shore.

Crazy-tall spindly loblolly trees zig-zagged toward the sky.

Way up above was a pre-historic freaky sight.

About twenty nests were up there, haphazardly perched on branches.

Herons were screeching, cater-wauling, shrieking in what seemed like a battle over nests and territory and females.

They dive bombed at each other in air.

It was noisy and discordant and primitive.

Totally mesmerizing, I watched till my neck ached.

The scene of a heron standing in a nest, peacefully looking down at the water for fish, while with his mate, is quite the other end of the spectrum.

That’s why rookery is an especially odd word to have in this poster’s title

but this artist’s license rules the day;

a small perk in the creative tribulations

of this paper-cutting, color-obsessed, painter’s life.

 

- NANCY HAMMOND, 2014