Black Cat Drawing - Morticia Stops By For a Critique

Tishy took a minute out of her busy day of cat napping to wander through the studio and take a look at my latest black cat drawing.  Black kitty Coco's drawing is in the works, still have a ways to go with it.  It's funny because I can do a black cat painting much faster than any other color of cat, but black cat drawings take much longer than other cats - days and days longer!  And that's because I build these pencil drawings up layer by layer and the darker the subject, the more layers and more time.  There's no rushing the process - it takes as long as it takes and really it is quite a zen experience :-)

Black Cat Paintings by Diane Irvine Armitage Facebook Page

Be sure to like my Facebook page - Black Cat Paintings by Diane Irvine Armitage if you want to follow my black cat painting adventures.  Click on the Facebook button on the right and then click on Like under the page banner.

Custom Black Cat Portrait Original Oil Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

Today's black cat portrait is Jane's adorable Pepsi.  I have been wanting to paint this cute face since I saw Pepsi's photo on my Facebook page.  If you would like a custom 8 x 10 inch portrait of your black cat, just click on the Email Me button on the right on my blog!

Two Headed Black Cat Original Oil Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

Today's painting is of a two-headed Tish!  I'm going to be using this painting for my holiday window display at my booth, Pandora's Parlor.  Yes, a cat with two heads is going to fit right in with my twisted Christmas theme, don't ask how ... you'll see!

 This original oil painting is 16 x 20 inches and will be available for sale after the first of the year.

Three Eyed Black Cat Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

Finally the weather is not topping 100 degrees, so back into the studio for some fun.  I painted the blue-green fescue grass that the 3-eyed black cat is looking through.  I'm happy with this one and plan on doing more fantasy and surreal paintings in the future.

This painting is available on my ebay auctions HERE.

3 Eyed Black Cat Original Oil Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

Here is my progress so far on this three-eyed cat painting.  It is Tish in the garden, but with an extra eye : - )  Once it is dry, I want to add some thin grass in front of her.

 Original oil painting on archival gessoboard, 8 x 10 inches.

Cat Painting - Black Cat Eye Closeup by Diane Irvine Armitage

Today's painting is 11 x 14, a closeup of a black cat face.  I block in the colors I see, squinting down to get the right values and then I put in some sketchy bits with a smaller brush.

You can find this painting on my Pinterest Gallery of Cat Paintings HERE.

Large Black Cat Painting Closeup with Whiskers by Diane Irvine Armitage

Today I painted a big version of the Whiskers painting I did awhile back.  Originally I painted this 6 x 6 inches.  Today's large version is 30 x 30 inches.

You can find this painting and all my other cat paintings on my Pinterest Gallery page HERE.

Cat Oil Painting - Tish by Diane Irvine Armitage

I really enjoyed working on today's painting.  This was painted from a picture I took of my little Tishy one day when she was curious about a display I was photographing and had to get in the middle of the shot.  I like how her eyes are very close to the background color which is the color of my back bedroom where I took the picture.  The golden eyes and background are wonderful with the overall black of the Morticia : : - )

I have been very inspired lately by several really great artists.  I am a big fan of Daniel Gerhartz's work and I bought several of his painting DVDs, which are excellent.  I highly recommend them!  I found a DVD of him and another artist painting a portrait at the same time and through that video I discovered Scott Burdick, whose work I really admire as well.  And through Scott Burdick, I discovered his wife, Susan Lyon.  I purchased her book and it is a really good book because she shows a lot of closeups of her brushwork which is to die for - very sketchy and wonderful.  Today I watched one of Susan's videos on Painting Dolls so I could see how she goes about getting that lovely loose, sketchy quality to her work.   Her video is excellent!

With today's painting of Tishy, I really loosened up and went for the sketchy approach, using some of Susan Lyon's suggestions in her video.  Especially about how to hold the brush.  It really made a big difference in my work.  Original oil painting on archival gessoboard, 11 by 14 inches.  I'm going to paint this same pose of Tish REALLY BIG.  That is this weekend's project.

You can find this painting on my Daily Paintworks Gallery Page HERE.

Black Cat Original Oil Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

Here's a fun painting of my black kitty Tish in a contemplative mood.  She's probably thinking about cat treats.  Original oil painting, 8 by 8 inches on archival gessoboard.

You can see this painting on my Daily Paintworks Gallery page HERE.

Fluffy Black Cat Against a Luscious Red Background - Original Oil Painting

Last night I was thinking that it would be fun to paint a black cat against a red background, so that is today's painting.  I love the red with the black!  Very striking.  This painting is 10 by 8 inches on archival canvas board.

You can find this painting on my Daily Paintworks Gallery page HERE.

Black Cat Looking Up - Original Oil Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

This is a fun point of view of one's cat, with the cat looking straight up.  Another fun whisker study on this one as well.  Original oil painting on archival gessoboard, 8 by 8 inches.  Happy Saturday to everyone!

You can find this painting and all of my others on my Daily Paintworks Gallery page HERE.

Black Cat Friday - Original Oil Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

Today's painting is of a black cat.  10 by 8 inches on archival canvas board.  I enjoyed the unusual pose and tried to keep it loose.  Happy Friday everyone!

 

You can find this painting on my Daily Paintworks Gallery page HERE.

Tuxedo Cat Portrait - Original Oil Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

Back to my series of tuxedo cat paintings today!  This one was fun.  I painted almost the whole painting with one big brush, aside from the eyes and some ear stuff.  I also worked on getting my edges right, which is something that I have only recently been focusing on.  Another lovely cat from the local shelter.  I'm happy with this one.  It has that loose, sketchy quality that I like.  Original oil painting, 8 by 10 inches on archival canvas board.

You can find this painting on my Daily Paintworks Gallery page HERE.

Interior with Black Cat and Cat Portraits - Original Oil Painting by Diane Irvine Armitage

Another interior painting today, this one is black kitty Tish on her cat stand next to a series of cat portraits.  I just love to paint an interior with paintings on the wall.  So fun!  These are cat portraits painted by the lovely and talented Kat Corrigan.  Her paintings are especially fun to paint small, this is the second painting I've done with them in the background.  Also fun to paint the light coming in from the window and the shadows on the wall.  I think I'll have to keep this one : - )  5 by 7 inches on archival gessoboard.

You can find this painting on my Daily Paintworks Gallery page HERE.

Sunshine

Another black cat in my series of paintings of cats from Petfinder.  This kitty is named Sunshine.  No, not Midnight or Shadow but a bright, happy name - Sunshine!  I enjoyed working with the dark blues to get the mid-tones and the lighter blues for the lighter tones.  Until I varnish this, the darkest darks, which are the black gesso showing through, just don't photograph nice and dark.  But then there's no taking a picture once it is varnished because of the shine off the varnish.  So what's a poor girl to do?  : - )  So just use your imagination and picture those flat darks all deep black and shiny!

This painting is available here at my Daily Paintworks Gallery page.  Oh and my painting from yesterday of the extreme closeup black cat is featured on Daily Paintworks Facebook page as one of their paintings of the day!  Fun!

Ace

I wanted to paint an extreme closeup of a black cat with the emphasis on the eyes.  I put as few brushstrokes as I could, leaving the black gesso to show in the darkest areas.  This cat is Ace, another darling from Petfinders.

You can see this painting and my other cat portraits here on my Daily Paintworks Gallery page.

Black and White Cat Value Study Paintings

Today's shelter cat is Freddie and I liked all three pictures of Freddie so I decided to do three value studies of him.  I am watching some of Peggi Kroll Robert's videos and she is real big on value and value studies.  Her series of video painting lessons are the BEST.  I highly recommend them!

I painted these 5 x 7 acrylic paintings on canvas board with a black gesso ground and tried to do them fairly quickly.  Here are the preliminary sketches on the boards ...

And here is the photo of Freddie and the finished painting.

You can find it at my Daily Paintworks Gallery page here.

Wednesday

The next in my shelter cat paintings is black kitty Wednesday.  I'm a big fan of black cats - I have two of my own.  I especially love their little mouth area and I found that kind of fun to paint today.  Since I was painting a yellow background for Wednesday, I primed my canvas board with a purple-y magenta color so it could show through here and there.

This painting is available at my Daily Paintworks gallery here.