Tag Archives: poodle

Bad Pet Portraits

Animals are my joy and consolation. If I’m struggling to concentrate, cramped by artistic angst, or simply need to warm up my drawing brain before starting work, it’ll be a bird, a dog, a horse, or sometimes a cat. (Cats are so much harder and it drives me round the bend sometimes.) But especially, it’ll be dogs. By the time I’ve scribbled half a dozen, my brain has usually caught up with my hand, (or is it the other way around?) and I’m ready to tackle a forklift or a crane… Who am I kidding? Never a forklift or a crane. Please don’t ask me to draw a forklift. Probably not a corkscrew. (Forklift authors, you know who you are.)

Anyway, when I noticed a little fundraising event coming up called Bad Pet Portraits, that raises funds for an organisation called Pets of the Homeless, my first thought was ‘I wonder if they would accept an erratic and occasionally good pet portraitist.’ Because this was for me!

We work to help keep vulnerable people and their pets together by alleviating the burden of providing essential pet care during times of hardship. Pets of the Homeless.

Happily, they didn’t seem to care at all what kind of pet portraitist I am, and I was signed up for a few hours of manic pet drawing. I’ve participated in two of their fundraisers now. The first time I attempted to make my portraits ‘bad’ or at least a bit funny, with mixed results. But really the stars of this show are the people like Phil Heckels whose pet portraits are pure magic and I can’t compete with that. So the second time around, I decided to just draw pets the way I draw pets, with the simple rule that I would draw them quickly and not fuss over them. In this I mostly succeeded and you can see some of the results below. (I did 23 in total, including a goat and several cats.)

This giant pooch, (a Great Dane mix perhaps?) died the day after my portrait was submitted and the owner was very grateful to have the portraits. (I did two of that one.) I felt so sad for the owner, but so glad I had drawn the dog.

Then artist Liz King-Sangster asked me if I’d draw her muse and beloved dog Gypsy. And here she is below. She has the most excellent ears and a happy face with a soft expression. I did fuss a little over Gypsy. Liz sent me the below photo as reference, with Gypsy lying on the ground looking very angular and with her front paws on the pebbles. I will not lie. I found the foreshortening somewhat challenging and the first time I drew her, I mistook her knee for a tail, and her tail for a very long foot! After lightening the photo, I discovered the truth. But ultimately, this pose defeated me. I couldn’t capture her expression, or her front feet! I have several sketches that demonstrate my struggles, but you will not be seeing them here. The most successful of them made her look cross-eyed.

Gypsy – the softest bag of coat hangers ever seen. All angles.

Not to be a quitter, I decided to look through Lizzie’s Instagram feed for more pictures of Gypsy to warm up on, and found this gorgeous photo of her looking slightly damp and full of joy. I can’t say the foreshortening was any less significant, but it worked okay this time, and I seem to have accidentally de-magnified her nose!

This next photo features Gypsy on her throne with a royally amused expression. My second attempt got closest to the humour, but I still haven’t nailed it. It’s all in the eyes. And true to form I drew it on the bottom corner of a bit of paper, so that I had to squish her royal highness onto the page.

Lastly, I found this rather hilarious photo of Gypsy with her squishy rugby ball, squinting her eyes in a very knowing way. The resulting drawing may not be Liz’s favourite of the images, but it made me smile. Fittingly it has returned to the true Bad Pet Portrait ethos.

I hope I get to meet the real Gypsy one day.

For anyone who is interested, the next Bad Pet Portraits event is in March 2022.

Experiments with Blobs in a Moving Vehicle (part 2)

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This is the second page of blobs that I worked on in the train last Friday. In this case, I was deliberately turning them all into dogs. I think that if I draw enough blob dogs, one of them will begin to emerge as a repeating character who could star in his own world. The nature of blobs is that none do exactly repeat themselves… they are new and special in their own blobby way, but there are recognisable types and that is enough for my purposes.

Only about half of the blobs on this page were in a state worth posting. Two were accidentally sacrificed on the McCrae Beach on Saturday as I tried to colour them with borrowed art materials and sea water. The results were worse than you are imagining now.

Yes, they were.

As far as repeating types go, one thing is apparent already. I have a fondness for whiskers.

This is Angelina the Bearded Lady. (Miniature Schnauzer) She has been looking for circus work for a while, but so far has only been offered work as a rat catcher.

This is Hamish. (Border Terrier x Dandie Dinmont Terrier) Hamish is going to let the chickens out on a blustery spring morning. He never chases them, because he knows they don’t like it. HIs favourite hen is a Light Sussex named Leonora Carrington.

This is Toby. (mostly Foxhound but his great grandmother was a Poodle) He’s a country dog. He left the foxhound pack when the others made fun of his moustache. Now he wanders the hedgerows and picks up a bit of work here and there. He is courteous to passing foxes, and they are sometimes courteous to him.

This is Theo. (Wire-haired Fox Terrier) Theo is in a hurry to pull on his coat as he has to pick up the kids from puppy school. There are 14 in the litter so he is taking a truck.

This is Gabriel. (Soft-coated Wheaten Terrier x English Pointer) Gabriel runs a delicatessen, and is renowned locally for his skill with making tarts. Once a fortnight he goes fishing and takes a picnic lunch with him which is made by his partner Phil. He enjoys taking a little time off cooking on those days. But if he catches a fish, he returns home with renewed vigour and invents a new fish dish every time. All of them are simply delicious.

This is Phil. (Irish Water Spaniel) Phil lives with Gabriel and is an indifferent cook as he gets very little practice. However he is a keen gardener and drives a lorry during the week. He’s also a bird fancier, but sometimes when he is watching birds too closely he has an irresistible urge to yap, which he finds mortifying.

This is Madison. (Cavalier King Charles Spaniel x Cardigan Welsh Corgi) Madison lost her tail in an accident when she was only 3 months old, but she is wagging on the inside.

This is Adrian (Scottish Terrier) Adrian loves listening to Jazz FM on his new radio and has been known to bite the vet.

This is Jean-Paul. (Irish Wolfhound x Cairn Terrier. His parents separated due to irreconcilable differences.) You needn’t be alarmed for Jean-Paul because he is demonstrating for 25 young pups at puppy swim school, and is not really in any danger as long as he stays in the water.

This is one of the puppies at Swim School. I can’t remember his name. He has just smelled a fart and is checking to see if it is his.

Blob Doodles in Bed

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I took some blobs to bed with me last night and a black felt tip. It being bed time when I painted my blobs, I wasn’t quite on the ball enough to remember to do them on watercolour paper so the paper has buckled and they lack the nice gravelly edges.

But it was a meditative and relaxing (but also kind of stimulating) thing to do, propped up by pillows in bed. Turning my page this way and that trying to find the hidden creature in each blob.

I found a few dogs who weren’t pleased with either their hairstyles or with each other. And one that has slipped on a banana skin.

wolfhound x poodle - whoodle judywatsonart lores

Whoodle (poodle x wolfhound)

Beehive Hound

Bouffant des Flandres

Bulldog

Bulldog’s buddy

Schnighlander – (Giant Schnauzer x West Highland White Terrier)

oops

I found an overexcited squirrel.

Didn’t quite work

I found a princess escaping a fate worse than death, cloaked and riding on the back of a miniature elephant in the dead of night. (with faithful wire-haired miniature dachshund x schipperke – also known as a Whipperke-Dipperke)