August 17 work in progress

Ha ha ha, this is REALLY weird to be using these colors on a chicken. Some of these blues are brand new never been used! So I need to put it down in writing that I've been referring to this as the "Fantasy Fowl" series. (at some point I'm going to break up the chicken art on the website to reflect this, since things seems to happen in series... head studies, Standard drawings, game fowl, etc.) The reasoning behind what I'm doing... well, it's complex. Chickens really do come in some fantastic colors on the own. I spent 2.5 years drawing them. I am entralled with drawing chickens, but I wanted more diversity of color, I wanted to get away from the Standard while still staying true to this drawing technique that I love so much. So the challenge is to take colors that DO NOT exist in chickens, and get these drawn birds to CONVINCINGLY wear these color patterns. Some will be wild bird colors (the red tailed hawk, the bald eagle, etc). Some will just be made up pretty stuff. My fellow chicken snobs will know what is and isn't a "chicken color." And of course it's a perk if someone recognizes what the color really is. But the goal is just to make it look real, when in fact it never could be.



Remember, tomorrow evening is the opening reception for the chicken art show in Fair Oaks! (details are a few postings back). I will be there after about 6:30pm. Come visit me!

This morning's ride was interesting. I headed out through the corn stand and was greeted by a couple of horse-crazy little girls. Shylah's a sucker for attention so I walked up to them and let them pet her for a few minutes. It's always great to be told how pretty one's horse is. :-) Went out and did a big loop, and she had stupid issues in one location, which is the same place she freaked out about the guys working in the field about a week ago. There was nobody out there today so I'm really not sure what the problem was, perhaps she was anticipating getting scared again? Whatever, I made her do circles and figure 8s and go up and down and up and down the side of the levee until she decided it was less trouble to just go forward without doing that little rear-strike grumpy horse maneuver or trying to break into a trot. Finished the ride by coming back alongside the highway (for the first time, I've been reluctant to do that)..she was a bit leery of the cars when the road level was way higher than her head (trail is down next to road) but okay when everything was within site and level with her. Some guy whistled! I am not sure whether I should be flattered or offended. I hardly think I'm whistle-worthy, but hey, I'll take it. ;-)