'The Avatar Purr', a painting of my dear Tortie against a background of my favourite scarf. I love the colour combination of Blue and CalicoCat and if this painting is to be my avatar (who'd have thought I'd ever have one of those!) there should be something personal there too.

Acrylic painting of a calico cat

My painting 'Wilbur in the Window' has a little bit of Ireland in it - what is Wilbur dreaming about, sleeping in his celtic window?
While I have tried to depict some mystery and longing, he's probably dreaming about rabbits.....

acrylic painting of cat with celtic border Acrylic painting of a celtic cat


acrylic painting of a cat at Halloween
This painting was a bit of a departure for me in the way of subject matter. Wilbur has been out wandering at Halloween and has picked up a little bit of Magic on the way. This painting was the first one to be chronicled in my blog and it was interesting for myself to look through it all when I had finished painting to see how it had developed. You can click here to have a look.

















Now here's the last painting I did in Ireland. It's a picture of Frankie and Wilbur in the field in front of the house.
It's one of the paintings I've done 'just for myself' - I wanted it, so that I can remember that I stood there once......


Acrylic painting of cats in Ireland

Frankie is so called because of his lovely blue eyes and liking for a good ballad. He lived as a wild cat in the surrounding fields for a long time.
We don't think that he was ever a stray - he just never had a home with people. But eventually he gave in to regular food and a comfy box (he never has been a bed cat) - even so, some of that wildness remains.
Our vet wears leather gauntlets.

Wilbur is the nearest creature Frank has ever had to a friend, which is why I pictured them together.
Difficult to believe if you should see him now, but Wilbur, my fluffy Muse, was a stray and turned up one day at the place where we used to work in Ireland....
'There's a stray cat just turned up,' said H. (short for husband)
'We can't have another cat,' said meself.

The following afternoon on my trek across to the ladies in the pouring rain, I first saw him sitting in the middle of a small patch of dry ground against a wall. This was somehow protected from the wet and the wind and he sat inside it watching out for The World. Our eyes met and his little thin paws started padding up and down (you know how they go).
I didn't see him again until the following morning when I was sitting at my drawing board nursing and cursing a red-wine hangover. I heard miaowing outside and there he was. I took out the pouch of cat-food I just happened to have in my lunchbag, and gave it to him. He ate most of it before it even had time to touch the saucer.

So that was the coming of Wilbur.
Today he has his own microchip and his own passport (with his photo of course).
And he's been around the A86 in Paris.

Acrylic Painting of a Cat

This is an acrylic painting 'sketch' I have done of Wilbur, he is very photogenic with his long eyelashes and his eye-liner. I would normally never leave a painting as 'un-done' as this one, as I love to put in detail and smooth out all the edges. But I think this picture is finished the way it is.
I am also working out at the moment, about doing commissioned animal portraits - I am thinking of a different idea from the animal's head on a plainish background.......something like the picture of 'Frankie and Wilbur' above, which includes a place or a house and has a bit of a story attached to it.


Coloured Pencil drawing of a Cat


Wilbur again - this time in coloured pencil. I was surprised at just how versitile coloured pencils are.
I've been experimenting with a combination of ordinary graphite pencil for the initial layout sketch, then a high quality felt-tip drawing pen, then coloured pencil, then a final overlay of pen. I've been very pleased with the way it works - but I think you always get the best results on coloured paper. Then you can use the white and cream pencils to good effect - and the sky blue really brings the picture out as well.
So I thought that I'd try a Wilbur portrait using coloured pencils.


coloured pencil drawing of a cockerel

I
know that I'm on dodgy ground bringing this picture into the Cat Section, but it's also done in coloured pencils - so that's where the connection is...
Three cockerels came to live close by when we lived in the house in Ireland. They were never ours to look after, they belonged to someone else, but we loved them all the same. We bought some chicken food for them and they would stand on the doorstep in the morning and 'cock-a-doodle-do' until they were fed. They really did 'cock-a-doodle-do' which was a surprise to meself - but my favourite, Paxo (in the picture) was very shy and would only make a very soft blurping noise if you were anywhere nearby.


Coloured Pencil drawing of a Cat







This is a portrait of our friends’ Cat, Diva. Also done in coloured pencils, so I'm having a bit of an experiment here. She has the most lovely face and very expressionable whiskers. Our friends love Ireland, which is the reason for the Celtic Pattern.













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