INDIVIDUAL AUDUBON prints, such as Great Blue Heron, Snowy Owl and Mallard Duck can easily sell for six figures. A full set of Birds of America, even one in somewhat worn condition, goes for millions.

Within seconds of the initial bid, the price jumps to $3.2 million, then $3.5 million, then $3.8 million, and continues climbing. Scarcely a minute later, the hammer raps down, sold, for $5 million to an anonymous bidder.

Later, several Audubon aficionados suggest that the price was too high for a set that has experienced so much use. "A fool bought it," scoffs dealer W. Graham Arader III of Manhattan. Arader, who boasts of selling $10 million in Audubon prints each year, believes $4 million would have been reasonable for the copy, offered by Providence Athenaeum of Rhode Island, the nation’s fourth-oldest library.

Yet the fact that even $4 million could be considered a fair price for a thoroughly worn set shows just how irrationally exuberant the Audubon market has become. In 1827, when Audubon began his magnum opus, subscribers, including the Providence Athenaeum, paid $1,000 for an original edition of 435 plates. Prices for full-set editions of Birds of America have appreciated considerably since the 1930s, exploding in the last two decades. One of the so-called double elephant folio sets, named because of the oversize paper Audubon used to show large birds in full scale, sold for $1.5 million in 1985. In March 2000, a well-preserved copy fetched $8.8 million at Christie’s, double the estimate and a record for any book sold at auction, surpassing even the Gutenberg Bible. Insiders say a prime set offered now would easily command $10 million. Meanwhile, prime specimens of individual prints of the most coveted large birds command $150,000 to $200,000.

"Everything about them screams quality. It’s the finest ornithological book published, even in today’s world," says Manhattan dealer Harry Newman. His gallery, the family-run Old Print Shop, has possessed nine complete sets of the double elephant folio since his grandfather bought the remains of a set that Macy’s was selling in the 1930s.

Audubon has long been appreciated as a naturalist, but the current mania for the prints reflects a broadening of his appeal to fans of fine art who recognize him as an American master. Valuations are also benefiting from publicity surrounding auctions at major houses and shows such as a New York Historical Society ongoing series that presents the watercolors Audubon painted in preparation for the prints. Audubon’s work exerts such magnetism for some that one encounter with even a well-worn print can start a passion. Marty Sidor spent several hundred dollars on a few poorly preserved Audubons in a Chicago gallery 30 years ago, and since then has built a collection valued at $700,000. Initially inspired by a love of birds, Sidor has become fascinated by Audubon, the man and artist.

Princely Prints
Restless and passionate with a flair for the dramatic, Audubon left voluminous correspondence for fans to pore over; his extraordinary life continues to inspire new books. Born in Haiti in 1785, Audubon was raised in France and moved to Pennsylvania when he was 18 to avoid Napoleon’s draft. He tramped around the countryside shooting and observing birds, eventually heading to the South. (Today’s collectors would be hard-pressed not to be intrigued by the image of a man traveling around the countryside, toting a 100-pound portfolio of artwork strapped to his back.) At age 41, the artist moved to England in search of financing for his Birds of America project, skillfully playing up his frontiersman credentials with a buckskin coat and flowing curls.