I think this is one of the funniest things I've ever seen, I first saw it, 8 or so years ago, in the dining room at Phillipe and Francoise Briggant's house, Lussault sur Loire. This is the same large country house where I've painted all the white doves for various paintings over the years.  The main house itself is a rambling, 17th century manoir onto which Francoise has added an 18th century cottage (now the very large and open dining room) and an enormous 17th century, stone barn (don't ask me how she got the thing "moved").

Francoise (a very wry professor of classical languages) has hung the dining room with a series of these prints, all of which depict the various, readily-indentifiable follies and vanities of the Haute Bourgeoisie.....the woman obsessed with shoes (apparently, Sarah Jessica Parker did not invent this all on her own in the 1990's), the woman who breathlessly reads every scandal-sheet (the 18th century equivalent of our celebrity tabloids) she can get her hands on, etcetera....and yes, half of the series is devoted to peculiarly Male affectations, follies and vanities (the "sportsman", the "gourmande", the "bibliophile", etc.).

Francoise was nice enough to simply knock the picture out of it's 18th century framing and make a very high-resolution scan for me.  So, I can now give that to friends (trust me....a print is hanging in my own, little-white-west-highland-terrier-filled house).  In any case, it's a delightful picture.  If you want a copy, simply email me at dterrydraw@aol.com, and I'll email the jpeg to you.  I should add that it's a large file, at 4.4 megabytes.  Once the jpeg's downloaded, simply copy it to disc and take that to a good print shop.  Printed at the orignal size (approximately 12" x 10"), it's indistinguishable from the original.  I have mine done at my local framers, and archival-quality prints cost only about 25$.

All in all, it's the perfect gift for anyone who, like me, is  more than aware that he/she could be accused of being afflicted by "Caninomanie".

Pencil, watercolor, & pastel

13" x 8"

watercolor and pencils

(and, yes..... my many legions of truly devout fans and constant followers will note that this small (even by my standards) landscape resembles the background of an older picture titled "Winter Ponies".  The fact IS?....the thing's been tacked up on a board in my studio for a couple of years, while I kept wondering what was "wrong" with it.  I finally figured out that one of the ponies was just sloppy (not that anyone else had said that).  So, I just chopped off the bottom half of the picture, thinking that I could, maybe, hang it in the back bathroom or donate it towards the collection on my mother's refrigerator?

 As usual, I'm my own least-adept critic.  The owner of Craven Allen Gallery asked if they could "have" it when I took it in for framing.  So, now it's "art" and is for sale in the gallery.

 Once again, I'm considering that I LIKE drawing...but I'm pretty useless when it comes to determining whether the final product is any good or not.

pen & Ink, with some pencil colorings

(basically, millions of tiny, rapidograph dots)

Christmas 2011

This portrait (like that I did of the boy's sister, Francesca Matthews, two years ago) was commissioned by their very canny, Italian-psychiatrist mother.  She commissioned the daughter's portrait a few years ago, grimly declaring that she loved her daughter, but was highly aware that, sometime within the coming year, her daughter would turn into a cantankerous and generally "difficult" teenager  for at least seven long years...so, could she please have a portrait of the child she'd lovingly raised, before it turned into an un-nerving stranger?

I thought (and still consider) that awfully funny....ande, yes, I just realized that this is a really crude, terrible scan.  Still, I don't intend to waste time fussing over matters such as this. The actual picture, which is huge, is lovely.

pencil, drybrush, and pastel pencils

2011

...yet another portrait of my very canny (and, I think, remarkably pretty) sister-in-law. She's a specialist in Urban Renovation of Renaissance architecture.  I don't even PRETEND to be half as smart as she is.   For once (and this was a christmas gift to her husband), I drew her without any of her 3 very funny, young children.

pencil, watercolor, oil pencils

2011"Chanteduc" is the justly-acclaimed Patricia Wells's (a fine critic and cookbook writer) home in Vaison La Romaine...in northern Provence.  I've found it amusing that Patricia (who's an inescapably intelligent woman) obviously makes a point, in her many books, of not being too entirely specific about just-where her house is.  I've gathered that she doesn't want to end up like Peter Mayles (who finally had to pack up and MOVE once all of his fans got wind of where-exactly he and his wife actually lived). 

12" x 10"

pastels, pencils, watercolor

2011

 I've never actually known any of these dogs, but I'd gathered that they were remarkably pirhana-like.  That suspicion was confirmed when I posted this picture on my Facebook page a week ago. The comments box was immediately filled by various friends, typing variations on "The ONLY time I've ever been bitten by a dog in my entire life was one time when I visited a woman who owned one of those damn little dogs...."

 Being, myself, small and white and fairly snappy, I've thought it best to keep my mouth shut about the breed.....

12"x 10"

watercolor, pencil, oil pencils, pastel pencils

2011

 I'm really hoping that I've correctly spelled the plural of "Bichon Frise".  I'm typing this in a hotel room in Toulouse, France.  I suppose I could ask the Algerian cleaning lady when she eventually comes by.....