The MOST important source of inspiration for painting ideas is our own lives... and what we like most.
I do a lot of commissions of animals, mostly dogs. Have animals ever held such high esteem with
their people in history? I know my dog is the sweetest person I've ever met.
A friend has me doing a series of animal portraits, for his wife, of all the pets they have owned together. That have died. Individual paintings of each. This includes about 4 dogs, and maybe 9 bunnies. (They don't presently own any bunnies, but have 2 dogs). His wife is a good friend of mine, fairly eccentric, and almost always dresses in black. So I've kept the paintings subdued, not adding too much color. A bit of a challenge.
I never knew any of their former pets, but I know their present ones. Both of their dogs are pit bulls, as nice as they can be. One of them, Frida, has that pinky coloring around her face, with white fur, and she is beautiful. Every time I'm at their house, I take pictures of her, I just love her pink face. So when I saw an image of another pit bull with the same sort of face, I decided to paint it and add paper as I do with a lot of my paintings. I colored her in pinks and navy as I was thinking a lot about that color combination. Guess who she ended up looking like? Yep, Frida. So because I am only painting their deceased animals, I decided to call the painting Not Frida. But I still think of Frida when I look at it. Here's Not Frida:
their people in history? I know my dog is the sweetest person I've ever met.
A friend has me doing a series of animal portraits, for his wife, of all the pets they have owned together. That have died. Individual paintings of each. This includes about 4 dogs, and maybe 9 bunnies. (They don't presently own any bunnies, but have 2 dogs). His wife is a good friend of mine, fairly eccentric, and almost always dresses in black. So I've kept the paintings subdued, not adding too much color. A bit of a challenge.
I never knew any of their former pets, but I know their present ones. Both of their dogs are pit bulls, as nice as they can be. One of them, Frida, has that pinky coloring around her face, with white fur, and she is beautiful. Every time I'm at their house, I take pictures of her, I just love her pink face. So when I saw an image of another pit bull with the same sort of face, I decided to paint it and add paper as I do with a lot of my paintings. I colored her in pinks and navy as I was thinking a lot about that color combination. Guess who she ended up looking like? Yep, Frida. So because I am only painting their deceased animals, I decided to call the painting Not Frida. But I still think of Frida when I look at it. Here's Not Frida:
