PELLSTON, Mich. — At home in Maryland, Eric Jackson’s recent art exhibitions along the Chesapeake Bay have involved close observations of birds and fish within the context of migration as a universal theme.

As the 2026 Artist in Residence at the University of Michigan Biological Station, Jackson has expanded his focus from the mid-Atlantic to the Great Lakes region and beyond, encompassing an entire North American flyway.

“I am integrating myself into the incredible history of University of Michigan and UMBS as a center for research and learning,” Jackson said. “I can’t think of a better place to embrace the ‘artist naturalist’ role to grow as a professional.” 

Eric Jackson art: Eastern Bluebird, Breton Bay, 2025, 30x40

Jackson is a teaching artist and adjunct faculty member at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. He combines wildlife illustration with large-scale fiber arts.

“I’m interested in how animals function as an iconography of place, often sparking memories and stories or home, travel and adventure,” Jackson said.

Through Aug. 7, Jackson is working on the creation of his “Field Guide to a Flyway,” a body of work focused on migratory species in the region, alongside brief field notes. When completed, it will be an artist naturalist account of northern Michigan as an intersection of the Mississippi and Atlantic migratory routes.

“The field guide work is well underway,” Jackson said. “I've been able to enjoy many field visits to the shores of Lake Michigan, Huron and Superior, and I've found source material at each stop. Most of the work is focused on waterfowl and shorebirds.”

Eric Jackson art: Redbreast Sunfish, 2023

Artistic Process

Each of the illustrations is being done in his characteristic wax-resist illustration medium, while the accompanying field notes will be creative non-fiction pieces which deepen the encounters.

While based in a UMBS cabin along Douglas Lake with his family, Jackson has gone on excursions in the field with research scientists as well as a variety of UMBS classes, including Field Studies of Freshwater Fishes. He joined the Field Mammalogy class on their overnight to Sugar Island in the Upper Peninsula.

The inspiration seems somewhat endless as he gets to know more people of campus while sharing meals in the dining hall.

“The community is amazing,” Jackson said. “I keep running into more amazing people doing interesting things. After the first week it already felt like home, and at this point I don't know how I'm going to leave.”

As part of Jackson’s process, field observations and site photos are developed into sketches and then transferred onto fiber for the final illustrations.

“The illustrations take time and many iterations, so I have a lot of work in the pipeline to keep pace,” Jackson said. 

During an art workshop making banners with the UMBS community on July 5, Eric Jackson demonstrated part of a wax-resist process.

The Art of Discovery

Since 2018, the University of Michigan Biological Station has welcomed 11 artists of all mediums to explore their work through live-in residencies at its more than 10,000 forested acres surrounded by lakes and rivers.

Previous art residents at UMBS have included painters, poets, photographers, a musician and a podcaster. In addition to creating their own art, the resident artists teach workshops for people who live, work and learn at the field research station.

“Eric is inviting us to look more closely,” said Karie Slavik, associate director of UMBS. “He's encouraged us to work together to create art for the UMBS community now and into the future. This place and our community of research and discovery is the best setting for collective work.”

During this field season at the research and teaching campus nestled along Douglas Lake, Jackson plans to complete at least a dozen 30”x40” illustrations of local species including a mix of waterbirds, raptors and passerines as well as several species of fish. The accompanying field notes will be between 1,000 and 2,000 words each, focused on animal behavior, surrounding landscape, human impact, and interviews and conversations that take place during the field excursions. 

Members of the UMBS community worked together to make banners during an art workshop July 5. The teams used hot wax at the center of the table to apply wax to their banners.

The goal is for the individual pieces to form part of a manuscript which will become a published book.

“I’m really fortunate that I’m able to combine my passions — namely fishing, hunting and art — into a career,” he said.

Jackson is deeply interested in the “work of the human hand,” the things we do and make as humans which create our culture.

“There’s a very physical, iterative process involved in the creation of my work that itself is a story which involves multiple layers,” Jackson said. “I like my work to reflect the stories behind each piece while also in a sense extending the story, as the pieces invite the audience to share memories and tell their own stories while they learn about the story behind each piece and how it’s made.”

This spring he completed an artist residency at U Maryland, Baltimore Co. (UMBC) for the Maryland State Arts Councils Folklife Traditions program.

“A lot of my work involves an intersection of artistry and community traditions, and I’m fortunate to be based in Maryland, where there’s a network of traditional folklife centers which have supported my work over the years,” Jackson said. 

After applying the wax resist and dye, the banners are hung out to dry. From here, participants later came back to their banners, adding new colored layers to their banner over the multi-week projects.

Leading Community Art Workshops

When not developing his own creative work this summer at the University of Michigan Biological Station, Jackson has been teaching beginner-friendly UMBS community workshops. Students, researchers, faculty, staff and their families who live and work on campus have participated.

The weekly hands-on workshops included the creation of a series of “tapestries” or banners what will eventually be displayed on the Pellston campus. The banners are place-based, celebrating the unique nature of the field research station and symbolism connected to it. Participants used a wax resist process which includes the combination of three components: natural fibers, wax resist, and permanent, fiber-reactive dyes.

“It was like the world’s fanciest tie-dye party,” Jackson said. 

One group of UMBS students held their finished wax-resist banner before dunking it in a bucket of cold-fuse dye, which will differentially change the cotton based on their wax design.

Jackson also is scheduled to host an art workshop with the Little Traverse Conservancy at Indian Point Memorial Forest. The public is invited from 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 2, at Chaboiganing Nature Preserve located at 10251 Brutus Road in Brutus, Mich.

People throughout the region can walk, talk, and make art with 2026 UMBS Artist in Residence Eric Jackson. During a brief interactive discussion, learn the unique process that goes into his artist-naturalist practice, then join him on an exploration of the preserve as part of his residency project, “Field Guide to a Flyway.” The session will conclude with an art-making activity to dye thematic nature banners which will be donated to the preserve.

Family and New Friends

Throughout his UMBS artist residency that started in late June, Jackson has been joined by his wife and two daughters, ages 8 and 13.

Eric Jackson worked with individual UMBS classes in the summer 2026 term to help them create their class t-shirts.

“We’re exploring the region,” Jackson said. “They’re tagging along for a lot of the field studies, but also hopping into the Nature Day Camp for children, making art, kayaking, and everything else this place has to offer. It is an amazing community, and we’re very grateful to be able to join.”

Jackson is currently working on illustrations of anseriformes — mergansers, mallards, geese — and shorebirds —herons, plover and killdeer.

“I've been fortunate enough to encounter a good number of species, but we're right in between the spring and fall migrations, which just means I'll have to come back,” Jackson said.

Get to know more about the 2026 Artist in Residence at the University of Michigan Biological Station in our Q&A with Eric Jackson.

Q. How did you learn about the artist residency at the University of Michigan Biological Station? And what attracted you to apply?

I first learned about UMBS from Dr. Jordan Price, a professor of biology at St. Mary’s College of Maryland (SMCM). Jordan frequently leads the Field Ornithology class at UMBS and we both work as faculty at SMCM. It’s my understanding that before Jordan, Dr. Bob Paul (professor emeritus from SMCM) led summer classes at the station. It’s pleasing to be a part of a tradition involving the transfer of knowledge from the Mid-Atlantic to the Great Lakes!

Jordan shared the information with me last year for the ’25 summer, but the schedule didn’t work for me. Everything he described sounded like pure magic, and what really sold it is the memories he was also able to share with his family. The fact that UMBS is also able to accommodate my family and bring us all into the UMBS family is what sealed the deal for me.

Eric Jackson art: Brown Trout, Gunpowder River, 2025, 30x72

Q. What's something that might surprise people to know about your work?

I’m really bad at field identification. It’s a core component of my work, but the artist research I do is motivated partly because I’m very self-conscious about that. Traditions inform a lot of my work, and there’s important cultural/familial traditions which involve learning the landscape, identifying fishing/hunting targets, and differentiating between those species. I’ve never been good at it. Is that a black duck or a mallard duck? Is it a brown trout or a brook? I want to know those answers, but I struggle. Studying species more closely over an extended time and writing about them are all ways I commit them to memory — knowing them in-depth — so that I can actually identify them again in the field, know where I can find them.

Q. What do you like most about your career? And what's the most challenging part?

Constant learning and growth! I’m someone who can’t be stagnate, and I crave new opportunities. That, in a sense, can be a challenge, as I’m always working on “what’s next.” At a certain point, I have to sunset past projects, which I’ve become really attached to but have to recognize the lifespan of the project has an end point.

A variety of art made by the UMBS community during an art workshop in late July.

Q. What do you think of the experience as a UMBS Artist in Residence? What are your favorite parts of the work and community life? 

The community is amazing — it's hard to get work done! I keep running into more amazing people doing interesting things. After the first week it already felt like home, and at this point I don't know how I'm going to leave. I'm honestly torn between on the one hand all the site visits I had planned to amazing places in northern and UP, and on the other hand all the amazing people and conversations I'm having right here on campus.  It's FOMO on both ends, I wish I could be two places at once!  I'll just need to come back to keep the work going!

To learn more about Eric Jackson, visit his website.

 

The University of Michigan Biological Station serves as a gathering place to learn from the natural world, advance research and education, and inspire action. We leverage over a century of research and transformative experiences to drive discoveries and solutions to benefit Michigan and beyond.

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Avril Wiers, on the left, who leads the children's Nature Day Camp at UMBS, and her daughter Hazel created a banner at the artist-in-residence workshop on July 5.
Members of the UMBS community worked together to make banners during a workshop on Sunday, July 5, in Nichols Lab led by 2026 UMBS Artist in Residence Eric Jackson, not pictured. The teams used hot wax at the center of the table to apply wax to their banners.
Banners hang out to dry in July at UMBS.
Banners hang out to dry at UMBS.