Cat Painting Update and Ice Bergs

ice remnants on the lake

 Isn’t it marvelous that Spring is finally here?! The ice went out of our lake yesterday morning when there was a stiff breeze, so now we have open water again. Actually, the ice is usually broken up on a windy day or two in the Spring and just blows east down the lake from us. The marina to the west helps the process by going out in boats to make waves. This year they posted a short video on their Facebook page showing them using a boat as an ice breaker in the marina area. The ice was pretty thin by then so no danger to the boat.

The first photo is of an “ice berg” out in the lake in front of our house. I took the photo early this morning while the lake was still. It won’t last long with the warm temperatures as the lake waters warm up.

I feel so lucky to live on a lovely lake with all of its wildlife!

Now that gardening season is back, I decided that it’s time to get back to exercising; something I’ve managed to neglect all winter. After walking on the treadmill, I did my “legs and back” exercise routine, and later in the day went for a short spin on Scottie. This morning I had a hard time getting out of bed! Ack! But, if I keep it up, the stiffness will go away.

In addition to exercising daily, I’ve set a goal for myself of doing some artwork every day this week, even if only for an hour. This is in hopes that both goals will become established habits if I keep them up long enough.

"Annie", 6x6 gallery wrapped canvas oil painting

I managed just an hour yesterday on the little cat painting I started a while back of our kitty, Annie, when she was young. Most of the time was spent setting up and deciding what colors to use and then mixing paint. So, I was limited to working on just one ear and the forehead markings before it came time to clean up and leave for the barn. Otherwise, I would have painted longer.

Please note my painting setup here. I came up with this brilliant idea a while back when I noticed some scraps of pegboard out in the garage. Even though I’ve looked at those scraps for years, THAT day the thought struck me that they would be perfect to use on the easel to hold small paintings and paintings whose edges need to be painted. I’d been trying to figure out a solution to this problem for a while now since I’ve been working on smaller canvases lately. How DOES one paint the edges of those gallery wrapped canvases without getting your fingers in the paint?

I had my husband cut a couple of pieces to fit on the easel and cleaned off the garage grime. Yesterday, I used one of them to hold the Annie painting, and it worked great! As you can see, the painting is resting on pegboard hooks. It can be moved from side to side to get at the bottom of the canvas, and I can set the painting at a comfortable working height. In fact, I might just expand this for use with larger paintings, too!

Now, why didn’t I think of this sooner!?

I’ve just had a chat with my gallery owner (Adams Madams, Central Lake, Michigan) who has requested that all her artists replace their pieces which have been in the gallery for a long time with new artwork. She is readying the shop for the coming summer season when the summer residents and visitors will be returning. She tells me that she gets visitors from the Horse Shows By The Bay people each summer as they explore the area when they’re not showing. These people have money to burn, so that gives me incentive to get some horse show pieces done to put in the gallery during the four or five weeks of the show. A series of small paintings of horse show dogs would be perfect as well as some leadline class photos of toddlers on cute ponies.

Ah! I’m getting super inspired!

A New Painting and Barn Fairies

I started a brand new painting yesterday. It’s my first since last winter, and I’m quite excited about it. In keeping with my resolve to paint only images which excite me and aren’t too challenging for the time being, I chose to do a little painting of one of our cats when she was a kitten. She was four months old when we rescued her from going to animal control where her chances of being adopted were not good. So, she was pretty much out of the really cute kitten stage but grown up enough to tell that she was going to be a beautiful cat.

Annie came to us round about from a neglectful home. In a word when we got her, she stunk! She had feces caked to her behind and other parts, so as soon as I got her home from the initial vet check the next day, she got a bath. As with so many things, she took this scary adventure in stride and bounced back with kitten-like vigor.

Annie was loaded with personality and energy and curious about everything. She was often naughty but so full of personality that she wiggled her way into our hearts. She grew into a beautiful, long haired cat but suffered from some sort of intestinal malfunction for most of her life. Just before Christmas two years ago, we had her put to sleep because she had declined so much.

I still miss her terribly.

At any rate, this little painting is an oil on 6x6 inch gallery wrapped canvas. I started by toning the canvas with a mixture of yellow ochre and naples yellow and then drew the main features directly on the canvas with burnt umber. That’s the first stage you see here. The main thing was to get everything in proper proportion.

I continued by laying on the first few layers of paint, starting with her eyes and making adjustments as I went. The yellow ochre/naples yellow mixture was painted in as the base for her coat. The darker areas are a mixture of ultramarine blue and burnt umber. When I had the main features fleshed (or furred) out, I quit for the day to let the painting dry before continuing.

What has me particularly enthused about THIS painting is figuring out that I can draw directly on the canvas without a preliminary drawing on paper and have it come out well. I’ve only done one other cat painting in my life, and that was a commission years ago in pastel. This painting has really boosted my confidence, and I should have no problem finishing it in record time.

Last night, I had a really good ride on The Great Pumpkin as Scottie is known in the fall. He was moving out better and managed ground poles with no problem. Since Ann and I were the only ones to ride, we played barn fairies afterward while the horses dried off. She swept the barn aisle while I mucked out Elle’s stall. Or, should I say Miss Piggy’s stall?

This morning I got a call from the vet letting me know that Scottie’s selenium level is very low; just as I suspected. If we up his supplement a little, maybe he won’t be so stiff and muscle sore as he has been for so long.

I’m crossing my fingers!