Bonnie

Bonnie

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rabbit

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Lisa
colour 8x10

Mrs Blore

Mrs Blore
graphite 8x10

Oakley

Oakley

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artbykarieann
I am a part-time pet portrait and wildlife artist living in the deep dark forest between the Royal Forest of Dean, Herefordshire and the Welsh border. A beautiful and inspiring place to live and create pet portraits and wildlife art.
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Tuesday 31 March 2009

Amur Leopard by Wildlife Artist Karie-Ann Cooper

Well it's 5 o'clock in the morning and I feel as though I'm going mad, really it's only 4 o'clock but we lost an hour for the great British summertime (hopefully it will arrive this year). I sometimes suffer terribly, I wake in the middle of the night and can't get back to sleep, sometimes I switch on the television, sometimes I wander around the house or garden but I've given up on both of those and after being awake for several hours I've decided to use my brain, it's too late to go back to sleep really, I get up at 6 to feed rabbits, guinea pigs, birds etc so if I drift off now I'm sure I'll be lost in space all day. Luckily I am finishing work early today to collect the new truck and I intend to sleep all the way there!!! Anyway, back to the important stuff, this is where I've got to with my leopard, it only looks a small update but the portrait itself is really very big, A2, in fact completely covering the sheet so I am actually making quite good progress! The colours on here are a little better than the previous shot, I've read comments about difficulties taking images, however I'm not sure if it is actually the taking them, or if it's my lack of photo-editing knowledge which may be letting me down. The thing is if I start a course or learn how to use it, it becomes another thing which takes me away from my art, so I'm stuck with it for now.
I'm also very pleased to say we have 2 possibly 3 broody geese, so we built three nests for them yesterday afternoon and made them little areas where they will not be disturbed, not knowing which of the geese will be best (usually Mildred sits for about 2 months, she's like an old lady now but for the past few years her embden eggs have been infertile and she sits until they explode underneath her, bit smelly! But she is relentless with her sitting and mothering so may yet do us proud with the toulouse eggs) so we have split the toulouse eggs (17 now) between them. If they all hatch it'll be bedlam in the goose pen!!!
And dear Willow was a bit manic yesterday, she did an extra hour at work to try to tire her out but still insisted on rolling around the lawn with Gypsy after work! I need to build her up for the summer as it'll be too warm to let her have a sleep in the truck and it is actually cooler working underneath the trees plus usually there is a brook or stream for her to get into, it's just trying not to overdo the exercise, she seems to want to do more so perhaps a half hour extra every other day for the time being will build her up. It's hard to believe she's only 4 months old, she's nearly as big as Zac the spaniel now and he's a big dog, she can floor him already by copying Gypsy' technique of biting feet! I'll get a new photo of them tomorrow and you'll see how big she is now.
Plus today is the last day for entries to my wildlife competition so get digging them out for your chance to win your favourite wildlife image as a piece of art

Please visit here for a chance to win your wildlife image as a piece of art.
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If you like my work please take the time to leave me a comment or become a follower (see bottom of page). If you would like to win a pet portrait of your dog, cat, horse or any other pet please see my new competition. It costs nothing to enter, all you require is internet access.
If you are interested in commissioning me please visit my pet portrait artist website or my wildlife artist website
Thanks for visiting!


6 comments:

Laure Ferlita said...

You've made a tremendous amount of progress! This looks lovely. I really like that little tuft of fur at her/his elbow.

The Comfort Café said...

wow karie, your pencil work is stunning!

angelandspot said...

It looks great already. Hurray for the broodie geese:) I can't wait to see who wins the wildlife contest.

Anonymous said...

Wow Kari, this is looking super and you have done so much on it, cant wait to see it finished.

Anonymous said...

Love the look you are getting on your leopard. Can't wait to see it finished.

Art with Liz said...

It's fascinating watching your daily progress on this leopard. At one stage these animals were deemed to be pests here and were shot or poisoned by local farmers. Fortunately this is changing as they have become endangered and consequently, protected. They are stunningly beautiful to see in their wild habitat.

Copyright (c) 2008 -2010 Karie-Ann Cooper. All rights reserved. All images, words and text remain the copyright of Karie-Ann Cooper. All artwork on this blog is protected by copyright law and must not be used, copied or downloaded without the permission of the artist