Creating the Proavis: bird origins in the art and science of Gerhard Heilmann 1913–1926

Abstract

Between 1912 and 1916, the Danish artist and graphic designer Gerhard Heilmann published a series of articles in the journal of the Danish Ornithological Society. From the outset, Heilmann's work aroused international interest, and in 1926 it was published in English under the title The origin of birds, setting the international agenda for research in bird evolution for the next 40 years. In Denmark, however, Heilmann's highly original work was generally ignored or even ridiculed by zoologists. This paper presents an account of those factors and events that allowed Heilmann to complete the transformation from absolute amateur to international authority on the intricate issue of bird evolution and bird-dinosaur relationships. It demonstrates how Heilmann's artistic abilities played an important role in securing him international renown as a palaeontologist, while at the same time his lack of scientific credentials led to his complete isolation from the Danish zoological establishment. More particularly, Heilmann's work is shown to have developed alongside and in connection to another classic work: On growth and form (1917) by the Scottish zoologist D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson.