InTucker Magazine

Welcome Home Birdie!

The City of Tucker chose Georgia artist Anna Giles Jeffries to design and paint our fiberglass cow as part of DeKalb County’s “The Cows Are Coming” public art initiative.

Anna Giles is a Savannah native with a body of work that has taken her across the state of Georgia and beyond. In Metro Atlanta her work can be seen on the walls of Foxtail Coffee in Dunwoody and soon in Johns Homestead Park with the installation of “Birdie,” as she has affectionately nicknamed Tucker’s cow. Her portfolio includes oil paintings, gallery showings as well as both indoor and outdoor murals; she recently painted a sizeable mural of Mississippi State’s mascot bulldog on a water tower in Starkville, MS.

“My work is all about capturing light and motion in my painting,” Anna Giles said. Her design for Tucker’s cow includes a Great Blue Heron and other birds in flight as a reflection of the park’s wildlife and significance of its rookeries. A tree trunk grows up one of “Birdie’s” legs and spreads its leafy limbs across its bovine canvas.

Johns Homestead is known for hosting a Great Blue Heron rookery. It has reportedly seen nesting herons for about 20 years. Great Blue Herons nest in trees and hunt in marshlands, stalking fish, frogs, turtles, insects and rodents as prey. They are migratory birds, but climate conditions in the Southern United States mean the birds of Johns Homestead may nest there year-round. The rookery at Johns Homestead has served as a fi eld trip location for Birds Georgia, formerly the Georgia Audubon Society, for years, and recent additions to the park include two bird blinds around the upper lake for birdwatchers.

Rookeries like the one at Johns Homestead are often home to about 50 pairs of birds, although they can grow much larger.

Over the course of a day, a scene of twisting branches, green foliage and various birds took shape beneath Anna Giles’ paintbrush. Her second day of work was dedicated to sealing the cow to keep its stylish new coat weather resistant.

The painted cow was installed in Johns Homestead Park on the trails by the champion tree in October. This placement recognizes the history of Johns Homestead as a farm with dairy cows for a portion of its tenure. Visitors to the park can see the cow as they walk the trails.

As wildlife continues to return to the park post-dam reconstruction, visitors can keep an eye out for blue herons, cardinals and other wildfowl reflected in both the cow’s artwork and the surrounding natural beauty.

“Birdie” joins the Tucker Town Green’s TKR sculpture and the Catlanta mural on the Downtown Trail as the City’s newest piece of commissioned public art.

You can find more of Anna Giles Jeffries’ work on her website agilesart.com and on her Instagram, @a.giles.art.