menagerie (noun)

1. a collection of wild animals kept in captivity for exhibition

I do love painting profiles...I used flat synthetic brushes for the face and courser oil painting brushes for the background to give more texture and allow the tonal ground to show through.

Aren’t these just the best Christmas cards you could ever wish for ??! My sister has a dog walking business and every year she designs her own card to give to her customers!

I wanted to try and paint a backlit animal. I found this image on ‘Pixabay’ but i’ve changed the background to include some flowers.

I loved painting Ted and setting him in this beautiful bluebell wood. Ted has a ‘squirrel’ addiction so its hard to get him to sit still like this for long. He has his very own sidecar which attaches to his owners Motorbike!

Sometimes the silhouette of an animal can say just as much about it as a portrait.  It can speak more of their body shape, muscle tone, posture and the way they move.

Linocut twists your mind somewhat as the lines that you carve out will be white once printed, the areas left uncarved will be black, not only that but the print will be a mirror image of what you are carving and if you make a wrong mark there is no going back!

He is pretty big, as rabbits go. he has a diet of green beans, carrots and fingers!! 🤣👈

I was really excited to be offered a commission to paint this amazing greyhound. He can be seen here (left) winning the ‘Coral Champion Stakes Final’ in 2016 by a fraction of a nose equating to 0.01 of a second!

I’ve been looking forward to painting Otis for a while now... not only is he handsome - he has an unusual hobby…

This painting took 10 hours... I absolutely love the composition and the chance to include 3 big paws! 

‘Pet Portraits with Personality’ is a new one-day workshop that I will be teaching at the beautiful, newly refurbished Studio at Micklem’s Farm in Berkshire, in November.

Painting a big ball of white fluff isn’t easy!! 

I have always found it curious how people say “oh I’m really not a ‘hat person’”, it seems you either are, or you’re not, with no in between! Me- I love a hat! 

…”I swear this cat could have got the world record for meowing”…

A painting for my sister’s birthday of her loyal companion ‘Baxter’. We have so many lovely memories of him over the years.

Submission, Process and reference pics for portrait of ‘Dame Mary Beard’ for the last of the lockdown ‘sky arts portrait artist of the week’ live shows. I’ve learnt a lot from these 5 portraits and its been so much fun to be a part a part of a global artists community during this time.

My submission for ‘sky arts portrait artist of the week’. This week’s sitter was the TV and radio presenter Clare Balding

...I think you spoke for many of us ‘artistic introverts’ when you wrote recently: ‘I really appreciate having an avenue to think without language’.