Poppy & Monty
JESSE WAUGH
POPPY & MONTY
2016
OIL ON CANVAS
146 X 97 CM
POPPY & MONTY is a depiction of my friend Keith Henry Williamson's two cairn terriers - a male named Monty (right) and a female named Poppy (left) - shown on "Pompy Hill" (Wildbank in Stalybridge, Cheshire, England), a scenic heather-covered hill in the Pennines.
I alluded to the heather with a subtle purple glaze over the terrain, and also included a Michael Harding King's Blue Light colour in the sky, which to me suggests both dusk and dawn, and reflects the sublime sky visible at certain times of the day and in certain seasons from the Pennines.
The tennis ball links the two dogs to archetypal Chinese imagery of two dragons competing for a sphere, which I have seen in the Orient, this opposition of dragons is in turn similar to ancient Celtic torcs, and this leads back to cairn terriers, which are very much Celtic dogs.
POPPY & MONTY BRIGHTENING
UPDATE 2017-02-03:
I repainted the sky and ground and added a flock of geese to Poppy & Monty. It looked too eerie as it was, although I love the effect I'd first achieved with the Michael Harding Kings Blue Light colour in the sky. It's quite pleasing and reassuring now.
JESSE WAUGH
POPPY & MONTY BRIGHTENING
OIL ON CANVAS
2017
