European Starling

“European Starling”
Acrylic Gouache on Wood
11” x 14”
Available for purchase

European Starlings are invasive to the United States. The myth goes that in the 1800’s, a Shakespeare enthusiast wanted every bird mentioned in the plays to live in Central Park, but the actual facts are more murky. What is true is that they’re here now, there are hundreds of millions of them, and they have absolutely no idea they’re an agricultural or urban pest that displaces native species.

I find it hard to be mad at them. They’re just following the food and the humans—something they’ve done for thousands of years.

In winter they form murmurations—massive, shape-shifting clouds of thousands of birds moving together like a single living organism. Hypnotizing is the word I keep coming back to. My six-year-old daughter knows the correct terminology for this phenomenon and will point them out unprompted, which I choose to take as a parenting win.

This painting is loosely inspired by the landscape around the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center in Beltsville, Maryland—one of the largest agricultural research facilities in the world, which has been quietly doing federal research on American food systems for over a century. It’s currently under threat, like most large green spaces and federal research programs in this area. The starlings don’t know that. They just like humans and the food they produce.

I painted this on a wood panel, which gives the whole piece that warm amber light—the grain of the wood becomes the winter sky. The starling itself is painted in acrylic gouache, which captures that iridescent blue-green-purple sheen that makes you do a double take when you see one in person.

Amanda Spaid is a visual artist based in the DC suburbs. Flight Path is where she writes about birds, painting, and paying attention to what’s alive in your backyard when everything else is just a little too overwhelming.