Boots

Boots adores Terry, in a very uncat like way, he's just nutty about Terry. Boots waits at the drive each night until Terry comes home from work. Terry unloads his truck, picks Boots up and hauls him around while he gets a beer and settles down. I picked this unusual pose because it perfectly expresses their relationship. Although Boots is drop dead gorgeous,( and Terry's not bad either) I just couldn't resist this moment my camera caught of them both. I mean, I did take some other more elegant shots, but this one caught my eye and I convinced Terry's wife Delores to go for it. Taking a great photo is just the beginning of the portrait process, and does not mean it's going to be easy, it just means the artist has a chance to get a running start. In choosing from amoung several dozen photos I usually take, I look for a photo expressing something of the particular animal in a particular moment that inspires me to make art.

Going to the Dogs

Here are some doggy friends who've posed for me, or I should say for my camera. It is easier to get a dog photo as many are trained to stay still for a time, but mostly I like to catch a candid pose even so. I just like the surprise shot that has an unplanned expression or quality. I take a bunch and usually one or two turn out. I love my digital camera A Sony 717, that has a lot of flexibility and a really great lens. Please feel free to share this post with anyone who is considering how their fur friend can become the subject of my art work...Since I work from photos I'm not limited geographically, or even subject to time. I've done several memorial artworks.


Chuki is the Princess. If left alone or left out, she screams, not howl not bark, screams! The first time I heard it I thought she was in mortal danger and ran faster than I've moved for several years to help. She is totally precious! In this small 8"x10" head study she has her summer hair cut.



Boomer lives in Marin. I think of him as a Steve Martin type "wild and crazy guy". He like all Australian Shepherds is very high energy, always ready to play. This 11x14 pastel painting is a sample of a head and shoulders and garden background.

Bugs is one of my earliest portraits, this is a pastel drawing. It's really challenging to do black animals...one has to invent new ways of seeing and really look at the highlights, even overdo them, and wonder of wonders if the artist really sees, the highlights are colors.

So to do this drawing I put all kinds of very bright strong colors down first then began to work the darks over them...have to be very careful not to fill up the "tooth" of the paper before you get to the darks, otherwise there's not room to put down the top layer. I don't do drawings anymore, I love to really layer on thick color to create depth, so I use boards specially coated with marble dust called Pastelbord ( by Ampersand) that hold a lot of color and let me do lots of layering and manipulating of the surface with water and other things.
The difference between a pastel drawing and pastel painting has to do with how much of the surface is covered. It's a drawing when most of the original surface is left showing, and a painting when the whole surface is covered.

BrightHaven Cats

Some of my favorite cats live at BrightHaven. BrightHaven is a non-profit animal place of love and learning, where special needs and senior animals are cared for naturally in a unique family environment. Once animals are accepted they have a forever home, free to roam indoors or out in private enclosed gardens. BrightHaven is dedicated to sharing its knowledge and experience through special programs and seminars held on site, to help others better care for and help animals everywhere. For more information and help for your own animal friend, or to read more about the residents whose portraits you will find below click this link www.brighthaven.org Here are three recent portraits, 2 of them are printed as note cards. To check out the cards on the site, check the announcement area on the right of the home page where it says NEW.


Whispering Sweet Nothings
pastel painting 9" x 12 " © Colleen Caubin 2006
Sammi and Fred are residents of Brighthaven. Sammi nearly always gets her way and here she nudges the ever sweet and obliging Fred for a quick kiss before dinner. You'll see more of Sammi on future posts, she is personality plus and dressed in the most beautiful colors


Blue Eyes
pastel painting
8" x 10 Sushi, a big, beautiful pure white cat lives at BrightHaven. She often pops up from her nap basket to see who's come or maybe it's time to eat!


Bobbi Sitting on Laurel B.
pastel painting 11" x 14" © Colleen Caubin 2006
Bobbi lives at BrightHaven. I caught a quick pose of him one sunny day sitting like a king on his throne. It wasn¹t until I got home and started the painting that I noticed he was sitting on a Laurel Burch cat print pillow. I really had fun with color in this painting, must be Laurel's influence. Laurel's life story is totally amazing and life affirming see her site laurelburch.com When I think my life as an artist is hard, I remember her( she has a rare bone disease that makes her bones constantaly break) and her joyous work.

Portrait for Dedee day six

Ok all done, sort of, I'm never really actually finished with a work, there is always some spot I'd like to change, and this last day is always the danger zone of overworking and losing all the life.

So I carefully rework the coat, change the light on the pillow, which does not get overworked because a friend walks in to see it about that time and tells me stop. Fortunately I do. Then I begin just a few touch ups on the nose and lips and dang! mess it up and have to spend about 45 min. getting it back to where it was. Enough already, the bane of the artist is never ever getting it quite right, which keeps us making more art so that's a good thing. When to stop is when it's as good as you know how to get it right now. Tomorrow is another day. What I'm happy about is this painting really does show a certain essence of her, a presence of dignity and grace. Now, that is in the art and can be shared for as long as the art lasts. Making a portrait is a way for me to say thank you to Creation for that unique animal and that unique moment of time.

The frosting on the cake was the comment of Dedee's guardians John and Pam, "It's Dedee, you captured her soul!" that makes all the work sooo worthwhile...music to my ears!

you can run time backwards by scrolling down and deconstruct this painting if you like. I did this and it gave me a view of time I found a little disconcerting as the artist, but it was educational.