Telling Stories -
Bird by Bird
Marissa Gibson '20 was out birding when the call came that they had won the 2023 Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife's stamp competition. Gibson's winning painting, in the Upland Game Bird category, was the annual competition's first watercolor entry. Their vivid rendering of three mountain quail now appears on collector stamps and prints, with sales supporting bird conservation.
Gibson, of Lacey, Wash., is a restoration technician for Ecostudies Institute, a nonprofit that conserves natural habitats in the Pacific Northwest. Gibson's daily fieldwork provides useful observations for their artwork.
Here, Gibson shares about the value of science illustration and their creative process.
Q. You consider yourself an illustrator more than a painter. What is the difference?
A. Illustrators tell a story through images that can be understood without text. For science illustration, I'm describing an observation or a behavior I've seen or would expect based on what I've researched. Almost everybody learns through visual information now. Having science be accessible through images is incredibly important.