Blue owl by Fluro-Knife – love it, the colours are so cold and alien…
I heard a tawny owl (Strix aluco) in the garden last night, for the first time in months. It’s an eerie sound and how appropriate for this Halloween time of year.
But this post is not a nature ramble but a collection of modern images of owls – see also my posts on the art of penguins and peacocks.
In this post I will mention the goddess Athena, witches and wizards and share with you some owls depicted using various media. In most cases clicking on the image will take you to the source of the picture.
Owls are surely the most iconic of birds, with their huge eyes and pleasing symmetry. No wonder the owl lends itself to logos like these…
The eyes have it – three owl logos
For the record, here are the sources of those logos: SpencerSmells, Mighty Owl Band and ulule. My last Google image search for “owl logo” threw up 10 million results – which just goes to show how iconic the owl is.
The owl has long been associated with wisdom, but I can’t off-hand think of any associations with holiness, which is what makes this next image wonderful strange…
Here’s an interesting one – an owl saint by ursulav – who knows what it means?
Owl by Jessica M Sanders – this one is certainly not holy…
Anubis owl by Bas Strien – looks lonely and cute – but also sinister…
Horned owl – I link this to a blog about spirit guides in American First Nations’ mythology, but I don’t know the image’s source. It looks North-West coast to me…
Pink owl by Scott Partridge
The above is surely based on the famous old Athenian tetradrachm owl coin…
Famous owl tetradrachm coin from Athens
There are many owls associated with wizards – although I have to say (female) witches tend to prefer cats. Who remembers Merlin’s owl Archimedes in Disney’s The Sword in the Stone?
Arthur (Wart) and Archimedes the owl in The Sword in the Stone by Disney
The general idea of an owl as wise mentor goes deep. There is Bubo the mechanical owl, witty sidekick of wise Ammon and brave Perseus, in the original Clash of the Titans…
Ray Harryhausen’s Bubo, the mechanical owl, in Clash of the Titans…
Not forgetting Winnie the Pooh’s wise friend, simply called Owl …
Wise Owl in Winnie the Pooh by AA Milne and Disney
More recently there has been wizard Harry Potter and his snowy owl Hedwig, although this owl is more of a bringer of messages than a bringer of wisdom.
Harry Potter and Hedwig by Courtney Autumn Martin
I particularly like the feel of this picture of a young elf and his wise owl tutor…
Owl tutor by Angeline – I want a whole fantasy novel to go with this one…
I know I said witches don’t have owls, but as it’s Halloween, I can’t help seeing connections between the Greek goddess of wisdom, Athena, and the idea that witches are women who possess wisdom and knowledge and are therefore to be feared by men.
Athena and the owl seem almost inseparable. One common Greek description for Athena was glaukopis or “bright-eyed” and this is also reflected in glaux, the Greek word for owl.
Glaukopis – bright-eyed Athena and the owl by Thalia Took – click on the image to go to an interesting article, too…
Here are some assorted “takes” on Athena and her owl…
Athena and her owl depicted on a Greek Attic ware lekythos dating from 490-480 BC at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York
Athena and the owl by Patrick McGrath Muniz
A lively Athena with barred owl depicted by Sara Richard
Lovely colours – a touch of the vampire to this Athena by Scebiqu
Manga Athena and owl by Celtic Botan
Manga Athena by Renko
Almost Athena – Viking huntress Frenja with her eagle owl Hugur by Johannes Figlhuber
The owl seems to appear in popular culture in equal parts a figure of fun, figure of dread or figure of wisdom.
The Owl and the (seasick) Pussycat by Stevyn Colgan
Here are some owls in a variety of materials…
Night and day – 3D paper owls by Larissa Holland
Porcelain Athena owl, special edition from Royal Crown Derby
Early 20th century art deco owl by Édouard Marcel Sandoz
Art nouveau owl on a building in Amsterdam designed by JWF Hartkamp
I rather like the simplicity of these sterling silver and copper earrings by Mocahete on Etsy
Stained glass and agate owl from Huckleberry Mosaics
This is an owl collage made of grasses and seeds. It is from a 1970s booklet I have called Collage, from the Leisure Crafts series by Search Press of London
I have also seen an owl collage made of paper clips and maybe one day I will make one of those myself – I have enough paper clips!
Steampunk owl collage by MandarinMoon (Chris Kapono)
Owl craft items can tend to be a bit whimsical but let’s end with a couple of wonderful objects with a sterner edge…
Beautiful blue owl fantasy mask by merimask (Andrea Masse-Tognetti)
This bone-look owl pendant shows absolutely no sign of whimsy – it’s in sculpted polymer clay by DesertRubble (Lynn Reno)
My friend Paul has also sent me this link to his picture of an owl tree at Stourhead, which I have promised to include – clever…
If you still haven’t had enough, here are a few more links:
Images of owls in art on Wikimedia
and here’s another one from Paul, a link to the Hawk and Owl Trust
The Squirrelbasket 
Before the tearoom at Ogmore Farm (South Wales), next to the Castle, changed hands, it was filled with owl ornaments.
A great way to keep the children (now adults) amused was to get them to count how many models and images of owls they could find. I forget the figure but it was certainly in the hundreds. Times change, the business has expanded and the owls have gone.
Amer-indian carvings of owls, such as ‘totem poles’, could be a nice extension to this column.
Images are great, but don’t trump the real thing. A couple of weeks ago I went for a walk at Lavernock Point and the first bird I saw was a short-eared owl which I flushed from a tree. Totally unexpected and a delight.
Sorry to take so long to reply to this comment. You’re not wrong about totem poles – but that would make a whole blog post in itself!
I have now added a link to your owl tree at Stourhead towards the end of the post – thanks for that 🙂
wise old my fav
http://www.beautifulwildlifegarden.com/spring-cleaning.html
Another bird saint – St Azul
Love it :>)
another possible link: http://www.hawkandowl.org/Species/Owls
Great, thanks. I’ll add that to the post 🙂
In India the owl is considered a bad omen by many. In my city, Bangalore, landlords have come up with an innovative way of getting rid of pesky tenants: sneakily let a couple of owls loose in the house. Most tenants hastily start packing!
Funny, isn’t it? I know in some places they are associated with death.
And when I think about it, my mother always said that if you heard a screech owl (barn owl) near the house it meant a death in the family…
Thanks for joining me on the blog and taking the trouble to comment.
All the best 🙂