Lion - Finished!

As I hoped I would, I managed to get the Lion finished yesterday. I took a break in the afternoon and went back for half an hour in the evening to finish off the details. So here he is, Unison pastels on Pastelmat, 50x70cm, and I'm toying with the idea of the name "Pride" suggested to me by a friend.

Lion WIP

Another quickie post today, I'm hoping to have this guy finished today at somepoint so want to spend as much time as I can away from the PC and at the drawing board. More of the lion done, will block the rest of the mane in then go back and pick out more details on the face.

Rhina Finished

I have just this second finished the portrait of Rhina, just in time it seems as Zac has come to pester me for a walk! Hoping to get her approved today then she will be off to the framers to receive a double mount ready for framing. She will also go up on the website today if I can remember how!

Lion WIP

Another quick post today! I'm busy in the kitchen tonight mastering another art, the art of Sushi! Not completely traditional as I couldn't get any fish quite fresh enough for preparing it raw, and mine will be vegetarian, but it's a fun and complicated dish to prepare! In the meantime, I have done some more work on my lion. Working from the left to the right so as not to smudge as per usual. I've also selected my next few reference pictures for the Pet Portrait Diploma exercises and will beginning work on them as soon as I can, which may mean the original art is on a back burner for a while.

Rhina - GSD in graphite

A quick post this morning as I wanted to keep the blog updated with all my work, but didn't want to inundate single posts with many different artworks. So here is Rhina, a female GSD commission that I started last night, and hope to get finished within the next couple of hours or so. For some reason, the quality of the scan isn't great but I'll make sure to improve it when scanning the final image. I've also changed her nose position slightly so it's a bit unsightly at the moment!Waiting to have our fridge repaired today and as usual the repairman couldn't give me an exact time, so I'll be in the house all day most likely with plenty of time for work.

Lions and Damsons and Jams, oh my!

As this, somewhat whimsical post title suggests, my time of late has been taken over completely by the afforementioned items. Damsons, as I've mentioned before, have become the bane of my existence, littering the garden, getting trodden on and trampled into the house and matted into Zac's fur. The fight back begun last week with copious amounts of jam and chutney making! Our cupboards are now full enough of damson preserve to last us at least a year, with more of the little devils still to be picked from the tree. My next plans are for Damson Gin and Vodka, which can be nice Christmas gifts and also will be great for my own personal use (in moderation of course!)


Onto the Lion: I decided to paint another large pastel piece in order to take to the gallery, and I found a picture of a male lion looking skywards in the free section on a stock photo site and thought it was a beautiful pose. So here he is, I'm toying with the title "Contemplation" but I am terribly indecisive so it may change several times before he is actually finished.

A little bit of painting after a holiday

I've been away from the drawing board and easel for the past two weeks, I've had a bit of a "holiday" consisting of staying at home and not doing very much but we also had my dad and stepmum visit for the first time since we moved to England in 2008, and we had a nice few days of exploring Leamington, Stratford and going to the Twenty20 cricket final in Birmingham. Anyway, I have started working again now, despite being drowned in damsons:



More on that later! But I have begun my very first oil painting. It's a bit tricky, but I'm enjoying oils so much more than acrylic! Here is one of the first stages of the painting, just blocking in colours and tones, will wait for him to dry and do some more work in the next couple of days. I also have the Bernese to continue with in the meantime and I'm planning to start another big pastel original so watch this space.