The Emu

I am living on what is called an environmental farm, in the southwest end of the Fraser Valley. There are dozens and dozens of fairly exotic animals and birds here - cranes, pheasants, peacocks, and eagle [no longer able to survive in the wild], four emus, chickens, pigs, a donkey, two mouflon sheep, two sheep with three recent lambs, and a Nigerian [Nubian?] miniature goat. When I moved here a couple of months ago, the emus in particular fascinated me. They are taller than me when stretching their necks, and have some very distinctive behaviours and sounds. So of course I had to draw and paint one.

 One of the emus in their very large field. 

My drawing

For some reason, I wanted to start with a bright phthalo. blue spatter and spray.

The eye done, and some light washes ...

A wet-in-wet wash over the head and neck ...

And some added texture and darkening. I could have gone darker, but wanted the focus to be the eye. 
The size is about 17 x 20 cm. and if you have a thing for exotic birds, the painting is available. Please just leave me a note.

Thank you so much for dropping by!

 

 Not much painting yet, but a fair bit of sketching ...

It's not a very finished drawing, but I like the pose.

Clifford, a decidedly cheeky pony living at a rescue in Washington state. The woman who runs the refuge is a saint for all the animals. I like to help how I can. I will paint Clifford, and send it to her. Hopefully, [as she has done before] she can raffle the image to get some funds for supplies.

One of the emus here at the environmental farm ... waiting to be painted.

A few cute chicks, waiting for a paint brush, too.

A nearby farm. I've had the drawing for years, and now I feel I am finally able to approach it with a better sense of values, shapes ... composition in general.

Hmmmm ... we shall see. My idea is to paint this in all seasons. Must work on different backgrounds and light source to get the best effect.


This should keep me busy for a while! I'm also going to work on a proposal for the land/animal manager here to have some small classes here, drawing and painting the many subjects available here - animals, old buildings and farm implements, scenery ...  ONWARD!!!

Decidedly a grumpy day ...

 Decidedly a grumpy day

                                              My new home on an ecological farm ...

Exotic pheasants

Exotic pheasants [of the female persuasion]

About 40 - 50 chickens, plus 2 guinea hens

 

Two mouflon

Four emus

Two sheep, possibly more, and some goats, soon

Lola on the left, Speckles on the right

SO ... what the hell am I doing on an eco farm? I've been here since mid-December. I decided to have a largish tiny home built, and find a spot in the countryside to park it. My reasons [and feelings] are the exorbitant price of any kind of housing in British Columbia. I want to be in a rural setting; I believe, 

like so many, that we have gone much too far off track from our connections with ourselves and Nature.I'll leave it at that for now. I'm sure I'll have more to say with more clarity later.

And it's a grumpy day. It started bucketing rain as I was feeding all the animals - a chore I do about twice a week. One of the pigs came at me, looking like he wanted a piece of me - literally. The donkey kicked me. Granted, he was aiming for the miniature Nubian goat, and it wasn't a hard kick. And the sandhill crane came after me; sometimes she's fine, other times she's quite nasty - a bit scary considering the length of her beak.

I'm writing this to re-connect with myself and everyone else. The "plague" and its sequelae have left me feeling rather wobbly. I am hoping that getting back to what I loved doing will ground me. And I also hope you all find something interesting, amusing, helpful ... whatever. Entertaining, at the very least. Bye for now ...