Peacock in the Woods, 1907
Oil on canvas
Charles Darwin and his followers observed that animals’ colours and markings had often evolved as an aspect of natural selection. By matching their surroundings, some animals were concealed from their predators. But in other cases, Darwin noted, colour served the contrasting purpose of display, for example in the gorgeous iridescence and patterns of male birds’ plumage.
This painting is a study for the frontispiece in Thayer’s book Concealing-Coloration, 1909. Thayer accepted one aspect of Darwin’s theory wholeheartedly, but rejected the other. He perversely wanted to prove that all colouration-even the peacock’s-served to conceal animals, never to make them conspicuous. Here the colours of the peacock’s feathers merge harmoniously with those of the forest landscape and the sky, producing a near-abstract effect.
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C., Gift of the Heirs of Abbott Handerson Thayer