Pet Portraiture
An illustration of my two trouble makers bowie (the cat) and cooper (the dog)
A friend from college once said “My picture is going through the ugly door right now.” I’m not sure if they were referencing something or if it was an original saying, but I feel this comment so strongly with every piece of art I make.
Well, sometimes it feels more like an ugly corridor than a door. Every picture has an awkward ugly phase of its life. Sometimes, the art always stays behind that door. However, for the most part the ugly door is just a phase.
My dog cooper. I promise he is cuter in person.
Pet portraiture is sorta new to me. Recently I made a diptych of my friend Brittney’s special four legged friends, Donnie and Perry. I draw a lot of animals, but capturing someone’s buddy is a different beast altogether. I experienced the ugly door so many times in this process.
Donnie was particularly difficult because of all his white hair. White is one of the hardest things to paint. If you push your colors too far the subject you are painting doesn’t register as white anymore. But if you do not have a full range of values then your painting looks washed out and incomplete.
In addition to this, Donnie has a lot of hair that is always changing lengths and covering key anatomical structures I would use as a guide. It was like every reference photo I had, he looked like a new dog. Eventually, I decided to draw a generic Labrador, poodle-ish looking base dog then add Donnie’s characteristic hair on top with tracing paper.
One of the many practice sketches I did to familiarize myself with Perry’s face. I think this one kind of looks like Cooper.
The end result wasn’t exactly the realism I was going for. The painful truth is I always shoot for realism in my work but I always fall comically short. I wish I could say it is because I'm making the very intentional choice to leave realism behind and embrace my own voice and style but I’m embarrassed to admit that is just not the case.
So, over the years I have learned to identify when it is time to push through the ugly door and when it is time to stop and rethink things. I may never see the results I want to see for my work but despite this people do seem happy with the work I make them.
The final painting of Perry. Not realistic by any means but still very sweet
The final painting of Donnie. I really like how all the colors in his fur turned out.
I do not believe my paintings will be winning any awards. However, I can tell you they were both very happy with the diptych. I think Ben even said something like “I didn’t know a painting could make me feel this way.”
Despite all my shortcomings and difficulties I think I still managed to capture that special something about my friends' special little guys.
Donnie, Perry and Cooper. Just BFFs at the dog park. picture taken by Brittney.
