Towards the end of 2017, I sent an email to the editor of The Newburyport Daily News with a painting attached, asking if the paper might be interested in posting an occasional picture of the dogs of Newburyport. The answer came quickly back. ‘No. Let’s make it once a week. It’s a Dog’s Life.
Let me back up here. I have never owned a dog. Well, my dog-loving husband gave it two tries. An adorable golden retriever puppy child from Thunder and Lightning, two mild-mannered golden retrievers down the street. We returned the puppy to his parents two days later. One trouble was I had no idea how to do a dog. The other was that our youngest two kids were 2 and 1 and doing a lovely job of playing together. The adorable golden retriever wreaked havoc on all that. I couldn’t handle it. The next try was ten years later when a lovely springer spaniel adoptee came to our house for a test run. One difficulty was, my husband was allergic to dogs, but the crowning blow came when our oldest son, Matt, complained that the click, click, click of the dog’s nails on the floor was driving him insane. He’d obviously never had a dog.
So, why draw dogs, you ask? Well, certain dogs have that je ne sais quoi; they strike me as people in dog suits. Irresistible to draw.
The weekly dog assignment became the focus of the week. I would keep my eye out as we walked, on the lookout for ‘people’ dogs and quirky owners. (I was perhaps NOT the best walking companion. Dear Bill was very patient with the frequent stops and starts. The pictures had to be candid. No posed animal portraits s’il vous plaît. I would take my candid, then ask the owner for the dog’s name.
The other piece of the puzzle was my introduction to digital painting, via Paper 53. I was intrigued. The tools allowed me to make pictures very different than anything that came off my paintbrush. I was especially attached to the roller brush. It opened up a whole new world of illustration for me. Plus, you could erase! you could go back a step or two! - a great antidote for that notorious terror of the blank page.
So that’s it, folks. My thanks to editor Richard Lodge for getting the dog ball rolling, and perhaps someday, when I’m an old lady, I’ll get me a dog. Or, at least, I’ll collect all these dogs into a book. Arf.
You did many Newburyport dogs true justice with you drawings...
All good, though we have a particular favorite.
Adorbs!