This year’s Twitter Art Exhibition in aid of Pegasus Riding For The Disabled is taking place in Canberra, Australia from 7-29 April 2018 (extra details can be found on the TAE18 website).
So with that thought in mind, I set out to paint a little French Bulldog on a postcard size piece of mountboard. He’s called ‘Ozzie’ and he’ll be up for sale along with several hundred other postcards that artists around the globe are donating
Hope he sells and helps raise funds for this great cause.
This cat is not exactly my niece’s cat but she spotted it in the garden of her London flat and sent me the pic. Bengals are a fabulous breed, quite exotic and regal looking. They also make great subjects to paint, all those markings!
This is Dylan, a commission recently completed for a friend’s birthday of her beloved Springer Spaniel. He was great fun to do as he has an amazing rock star hairdo!
Oil on canvas to give a soft, hazy effect.
Here’s a photo of a recent commission of Dolly, a young golden cocker spaniel who was a delight to paint.
Her owner sent me really good crisp photos to work from, always a bonus!
The best part was getting to meet the model when the client arrived to collect the painting. She’s such a cutie 🐶💕
On Saturday 26 August, it is National Dog Day – celebrating our canine friends all over the world. With that in mind, here is a collection of a few of my paintings of pooches who are awaiting their forever homes… or walls! A mixture of breeds and all lovely characters who make, or have made, our lives just that bit more fun.
In between painting pet portraits to commission or new paintings for my ‘wall’ at a local Antiques & Art Centre, I practice by using reference photos taken on my phone of anything and everything and also by using online photo reference sites which I recently joined.
This ‘Siamese’ is from a photographer called Charlotte White on a Facebook photo ref site for artists and she has beautiful shots of unusual breeds of cats which are always fun to try out.
Life is all about trying something new, different or out of your comfort zone, so with that in mind, I set about painting my first skull. I was given a Herdwick ram skull as a gift (hmmm?!) from a friend who had found it whilst out on a walk in the Lake District (U.K.).
Herdwick are a tough breed of sheep well known in the Cumbrian fells and their beautiful wool is used in carpets as well as clothing.
The painting was given to the skull presenter for her birthday…..thankfully, she loved it!
I recently sent four of my paintings to have a limited edition of giclée prints produced by a local printing company called Deadly Digital in Glasgow. I was really pleased with the results and now have them ready for selling.
The sheep prints (‘Yorkshire Ewe’) are taken from my painting of a gorgeous photograph by Jan Lever with her kind permission.
Here’s a couple of photos showing the prints; my art unit at Garrion Bridges Garden & Antiques Centre, and how one of them looks in a frame.
We’ll see how this latest venture works out.
Rosie 🤓
That’s ‘Magnus’ sold and heading off to his new home – delighted to have a sale, but I’ll sort of miss him!
I’m hoping to start a new avenue of marketing soon, just getting things in place, dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s, and then I can launch it.
Happy New Year! The start of the year means looking ahead with hope, anticipation and enthusiasm. 2016 was a bit of a tough one for me, so it’s time to move forward and hope 2017 will be better. I’m sure I’m not the only person feeling this way.
With that in mind, I plan to be more productive with my artwork and also try to get it “out there” in the big wide world.
As Jim Royle once said in Caroline Aherne’s brilliant TV comedy series ‘The Royle Family’, “Those dishes won’t do themselves, Barb” – of course, this will leave you puzzled if you are reading this outside the UK!! It just means, if you want to get a job done, get on with it.
So without further ado, here are a couple of progress stage & completed paintings I can now reveal, that were commissioned for Christmas gifts, as I sign off for the time being and get cracking on some new work.
👋🏻🤓🎨
Rosie Mark Artwork 