Sophie, the original Brown Hound

This painting has been a bit of fun that I’ve been working on here and there for a little while. Mainly I’ve worked on it when suitable paint from another project needed using up at the end of the day. I was working from a photo I took of Sophie, so I didn’t need to wait for the right light conditions as I would for ongoing work from life. In keeping with all my work though, I didn’t want a direct copy of a photograph. I wanted to make a painting – with expression and brushstrokes. Something a little abstract in the background, left unrefined, a little made up.

Sophie is very nearly 15 years old now and is ageing quite rapidly. In truth, she’s doing very well, but I see the difference in her on a weekly basis. She’s losing muscle tone and her spine is feeling very boney as it pushes out along the line of her back. She trots along on a walk, usually a little behind, where once she would have run 10 miles to every one of mine. She sleeps a lot, and her face stays squashed for ages when she wakes up, usually with her tongue sticking out. She’s a little confused at times, occasionally cantankerous, but utterly adorable too. I love her. Ageing is indeed a cruel twist of nature – though better in spades than the alternative of course – and it’s heartbreaking to watch her decline. It was important to me to paint her (again) while she is still alive. It’s not a memorial picture, although it is a painting that I will frame and always keep with me as a memory of both her and me; a time in both our lives.