Summer 2009 - Farm Animals

I painted all of these on the same day...these animals had me on a roll! They belong to Karen Guy, owner of a farm in Hermitage. Fortunately for me, I also live in Hermitage, and Karen has welcomed me to come paint on her land from time to time. 

Karen loved this painting of her horse Traveller; she thought it looked exactly like him. I gave her this 3x4 inch portrait to keep. I was able to paint Traveller from life by tantalizing him with a bag of pretzels the whole time, and feeding him one if he seemed to start losing interest. Now you know what a hungry horse looks like.

Karen recognized this horse from the painting. He is her other horse, Odie. She said she would know that big ole jughead anywhere! I eventually gave her this painting, too.

Here is a mother-daughter duo. The calf is Mayflower, so named because she was born in May, and the mother is Squirm. Squirm is an undersized cow that Karen had originally feared would not survive to adulthood. Now she's so fond of Squirm, the lucky cow is now a permanent resident of the farm, not to be sold. I'm not sure Mayflower is also a pet...I hope so! I love the way their tails swished as they ate.

These are the "peaboys," also having a meal. I was enchanted by the iridescent (and impossible to paint) neck feathers, which fluctuated between royal blue, turquoise, and sea green.

Summer 2009 - Pets on the Porch

These are all on 3x4 stretched canvas, painted from life on my back porch. I loved going outside in the summer heat, sitting on a lawn chair, and paint sketching my animal friends. Ember is the cat, better known as "Kee," and Capone is the dog, a boxer. You can see on the lattice and board where my boyfriend (at the time) and I ran out of stain while painting the deck.