Ray Harris-Ching
Artist

Ray Harris-Ching was born in Brooklyn Wellington, New Zealand in 1939. Even though he now resides in England, he still makes numerous trips back to his homeland.

Ray's first paintings were first seen in Auckland in 1966, with a showing of thirty watercolors and gouaches of birds. These early paintings and a further collection shown the following year, firmly established his reputation in New Zealand and formed the basis of work that was, by 1972, recognized among the finest of its kind in the world.

In 1966 The Reader's digest commissioned Mr. Ching to illustrate their now famous book, THE BOOK OF BRITISH BIRDS. In less than one year Ray completed the 250 paintings necessary to finish the book. Although this was a monumental task for any artist, Ray sacrificed neither accuracy nor detail. Consequently, many ornithologists, including Sir Peter Scott, have acclaimed the book to be the finest of its kind yet produced.

Seven books have been published on the work of Ray Harris-Ching. The first was THE BIRD PAINTINGS, which contains twenty-six full-page color plates and fifty drawings. This as followed by STUDIES AND SKETCHES OF A BIRD PAINTER. The third book, THE ART OF RAYMOND CHING, features both wildlife and non-wildlife subjects. WILD PORTRAITS has over 200 plates of birds and mammals. Of these 200 plates, 180 of them are published here for the first time. The fifth book, part of a Masters of the Wild series, RAY HARRIS-CHING, features more than 100 color plates and numerous drawings. KIWIS has some 75 color and black and white illustrations in this beautiful book. VOICE FROM THE WILDERNESS-RAY HARRIS-CHING has 110 color and black and white illustrations.

Usually an artist's strongest critics are his fellow artists. In the case of Ray Harris-Ching many of his contemporaries consider him to be the greatest bird painter of the century.