Above: French Bulldog study in my in-studio journal, a Fabriano Venezia 9 x 12 inch journal. Pentel Pocket Brush Pen covered (except at the chin) with Schmincke Gouache. Right edge clipped in scanning. Click on the image to view an enlargement.
I thought you might enjoy seeing the before and after, and this time I remembered to get the camera out before I painted. I'm still toying around with cobalt blue and I'm not entirely happy with it. It makes lovely purples with my reds, but I don't get the darks I get when I use my beloved PB60. I'm still undecided. But this it the type of thing I do when I'm undecided.
Dick went to bed when the dog was still in process and there was a hideous green on the dog's forehead (top left side of his head). I don't know what I was thinking. "Looks great," said Dick as he departed for the night. Of course I'm sloshing paint around like my life depended on it, because it did, and I'm wondering when he started to ingest hallucinogens because the sketch was looking awful. I asked him the next morning and he simply said, "I wasn't worried, I've seen you paint before. It changes in an instant."
It's nice to instill that type of affectionate confidence, but I suggested non-commital responses might be better in future—I actually debated waking him up to test to see if he'd had a stroke.
And yes, the expression is a reflection of "me" on hearing I may never move. (What gets clipped off at the bottom of the right hand page is "[A scary pause]" and by that I mean, when he said "Yes" he then paused and said "Probably." That last word is a rather loaded one in our lexicon, somehow attaching to itself, over time, the inverse meaning that others might expect.)
Below: The sketch without paint. I have to admit (but everyone has already guessed it) that I'm rather addicted to simply moving the Pentel Pocket Brush Pen across the surface of my favorite papers. Click on the image to view an enlargement.
