In Your Face

Cirque du Kitty
6" x 6"
Oil with a palette knife on board
NFS

The colors of this painting got a little crazy, like circus crazy. But I'm liking how it came out. This cat's eyes reminded me of the poster for the musical Cats-so striking! He has a very regal, wild, tigerlike face, don't you think? I am enjoying doing these really tight close ups of the animal faces. If you have a cat yourself, you have probably seen this in your face at about 5 am checking to see if you are awake. Isn't it time to eat?

Wide-eyed kitten face

Wide-eyed Kitten Face

6" x 6"

Oil with a palette knife on board
SOLD

This is Gadjo. He is Rumi's little brother. This painting was done from a photo of him when he was just a kitten. He is now a young man and fitting right in with the rest of the critters. Check him out on Jala Pfaff's blog and while you are there, take a look at her new beautiful pastels. Quite a treat.

Here's lookin' at you, kitty

Here's Lookin' at you, Kitty
6" x 6"
Oil with a palette knife on board
SOLD

I was captivated by the cute pose of this sweet white kitty. His name is Rumi and he is deaf which is ironic because the pink color of his ears was one of things that first attracted me to this picture. He has grown up to be quite the character and I have been following his antics on a blog by a fellow artist, Jala Pfaff. You can check in on Rumi and her other furry creatures by clicking here. The photo was used as reference with her permission.

Maggie

Maggie

4" x 4" x 1.5"

Oil with a palette knife on cradled artist board
NFS

This is Maggie. She is my dad and stepmom's Bichon Frise. I recently found the cutest photo of her as a puppy and wanted to give painting her a try. This is the same size as the Santa face I painted for Christmas and I had the tight crop of that painting in mind when I composed this one. This was a lot tougher than I thought it would be.

Portrait Swap

Artist Suzy Charto

Oil with a palette knife on cradled artist board

8" x 8"

This is my entry for the latest challenge from Karin Jurick's blog, Different Strokes from Different Folks. This mystery artist will also paint a portrait of me from a photo that I submitted. I remember looking at all of the amazing portraits that were painted last year and knowing that I would want to participate should Karin do it again. What fun this was and I can't wait to find out who my mystery artist is.

UPDATE 12-29-09 Suzy Charto is my mystery artist! Here is the link to the painting she did from my photo. Her blog is so fun to read.

Oh, and this is really cool. Karin is making videos of all of the portraits and posting them on You Tube. There are 4 parts to the series. Check them out!

Part 2-My first pet portrait commission

Ruby and Daisy

10" x 10"

Oil with a palette knife on artist board
SOLD

The first pet portrait commission I received was from Kathy Weller of her dogs Daisy and Ruby. Kathy is an extremely talented pet portrait artist herself, so the fact that she wanted me to do a pet portrait painting for her was totally flattering. Here are the photos she sent me to use as reference. Aren't they the cutest things? You can see their personalities coming through in these images. I think my favorite part to paint was Daisy's tiny pink tongue sticking out.

I decided to use the dogs' positioning from one photo and the background from the other for more color. Here is a photo of the sketch stage.