A dear friend of the family, Cara, asks me to paint her cat, Linus, who passes away recently. I paint Linus with all the love I can to capture his essence in the layers of glaze in his eyes and coat and the abstracted blanket he is lying on in the photo.
This is a gateway for me, as I always paint abstractly, but begin to consider painting more representationally. Then, I paint Harvey and Harry, the dogs of my childhood friend Celia. I do this as a surprise for her, especially since I secretly think that Harvey is named for my father. This painting is also done from a photo. I decide to begin a pet painting business. My goal is to paint animals in the subtle, abstract style of Franz Marc, combining my fascination with abstraction and color into recognizable animal form.
