Lively characters donning cowboy hats and boots, artistic designs with bright colors against vibrant backgrounds, and detailed scientific illustrations down to the wing patterns—these are the artistic styles that artist Liz Clayton Fuller, known as ipaintbirbs on social media, uses to depict all of your favorite birds.
There’s a reason for this variety—Clayton Fuller’s scientific illustrations were developed for educational purposes as a service to science, while her fun and fine art designs serve as a place of joy for both her and her audience. Clayton Fuller drew inspiration from the latter when creating the 2024 Audubon’s Let’s Go Birding Together design. You can find it here on apparel, tote bags, and more.
To learn more about Clayton Fuller’s process—including how they created this design for us—her inspiration, and more, we chatted with them on Instagram. Read on for a curated version of the conversation, which has been edited for length and clarity, and then watch the entire interview at the end.
How did you get started with illustrating and becoming passionate about birds?
Ever since I can remember, I was always drawing or painting. Even as a kid, my parents were throwing me art supplies, and I’m very thankful to them for that. I always wanted to be an artist. I went to art school twice, and I found my lane, started illustrating birds, and didn’t look back from there.
It’s interesting because the passion for art was always there. But birds came a lot later. I know a lot of people who are into birding were raised with birding. But I came to birds through my art in college in my senior year of art school. It took a while, but I’m glad to be here, and I’ve made every one of my family birders. So it really worked out that way.
What does your artistic process look like for a project like the Let’s Go Birding Together design you created for Audubon?
Every process for every project looks a little bit different. But for this one, y’all reached out and said, “We want to do the Let’s Go Birding Together campaign—our focal bird is the [Painted Bunting], what do you think?” Also, y’all were kind enough to [say], “We know you like to put birds in little outfits, so feel free to go for it.” So I thought, “Okay, we’ve got a Painted Bunting and the slogan is Let’s Go Birding Together (LGBT).” And I wanted to create a bird who [looked] like they were inviting you to go birding with them.
So I did some sketches, sent them to y’all, honed in on which one we liked, and from there, refined the sketch and went into painting. For this project, I talked with Kristina [Deckert, senior creative director,] about doing a combo of traditional and digital—which is new for me but has been exciting because I’m a painter first and foremost, but I like to add some little sprinkles of digital art in there. So [I did this] painting originally in gouache. Then I scanned it in and added a lot of the details digitally. That’s the step-by-step of how this cute little guy who wants you to go birding together came to be.
How do you approach your scientific illustrations versus your fine art designs?
I might have split into even threefold now. I have scientific illustration, fine art, and then this joyful new style of illustration that I’ve been doing for a couple of years. I approach them all in different ways. I started out when I became a scientific illustrator [thinking] all of my work was going to be hyper-detailed, super-focused, and very serious. That was awesome, but it was unsustainable. I needed a flip side to my art that was a little bit more joyful and gave me a rest from the scientific illustration because it is so focused and so demanding. I was feeling the need for a different type of art to help me stay focused and excited about my work.
With scientific illustration, when I [start] a piece, my desktop is full of references—I never have a single reference for any bird that I’m illustrating. It’s usually at least six if not more than that. The scientific illustration is very detailed. I’m counting feathers—I’m looking at all these references and taking it very seriously, because usually I’m collaborating with an ornithologist. For my illustrative and fine artwork, I get to relax a little bit and make art that comes from a place of joy, excitement, and love. For those illustrations, sometimes I’ll have a couple of references—sometimes I’ll start a painting because I saw a bird, and I got excited about it, instead of it being part of a project. It’s more for me hoping to inspire joy in others. So those are the different ways that I approach that type of art.
What inspires you to create certain series like your ‘Yeehaw Birbs’ series?
The ‘yeehaw birbs’ have come up in the last couple of years, and they were a response to needing a relief. I am from Nashville, and we’re a very ‘yeehaw’ place. So I was drawing and painting birds super detailed. And I [thought], “What if I just put them in a little cowboy hat with little cowboy boots just for fun?” So I tried it. My very first one was a Carolina Chickadee. They’ve got some very radical cowboy hats and cowboy boots there. But I started doing it, and it brought me a ton of joy. It also brought other people a lot of joy. I think that the ‘yeehaw birbs’ can bring people into the birding fold in a way that scientific illustration maybe doesn’t have the power to do.
So I’ve been enjoying painting all of my favorite backyard birds in their finest yeehaw apparel because it makes me happy. And that’s important when you’re trying to sustain your art practice. If it’s not fun, you’re not going to want to keep doing it. So if there are any artists out there who need a little unsolicited advice, make sure that you’re having fun with your work. Sometimes you need that balance of joy to keep your creativity sustained.
Why do you think art is important?
I think that art has the power to connect us as individuals and as individuals to nature. My biggest dream for my work is that it will spark joy in folks and inspire them to want to connect with nature more and want to see what birds are around them. Even if it’s something as silly as them seeing a cardinal in a cowboy hat and boots and then deciding that maybe they want to get a bird feeder. Then the birds come to their feeder, and they’re like, “This is amazing—maybe I want to go birding; maybe I want to be more invested in conservation.” I think that art can be such a powerful tool to get people excited about something and seeing things that are beautiful. It’s not that every piece has to have some sort of deep, complex meaning. Sometimes it is simply meant to make you smile. And that is important too because we all could use more joy in our lives.
Want to learn more about Liz’s birbs and other work? Watch our full conversation with her below.
