The Feline Advisory Bureau is a charity dedicated to promoting the health and welfare of cats. This year is their 50th anniversary and among the celebrations FAB are launching a new book Essential Cattitude: an insight into the feline world. To illustrate the book FAB asked cat loving artists and celebrities to contribute pictures of their favourite felines and I donated ‘The Boss’ a painting of Cassie to the cause.

The book was launched at The Groucho Club in London in February 2008. You can find out much more about Essential Cattitude: An Insight Into The Feline World and even buy a copy on FAB’s web site www.fabcats.org.

Cassie is lying on the kitchen table (where she isn’t supposed to be) gazing out of the window watching the birds. Her huge blue eyes, appealing expression and wonderfully silky coat are guaranteed to melt any human heart. She is undeniably cute, (and she knows it) we are putty in her paws. She is known to one and all as The Boss and she maintains a benevolent tyranny over humans and cats alike. However, our large male Bengal feels the need to challenge her authority occasionally, apparently lulled into a false sense of security by her diminutive size. This is always a mistake! Once the fur has stopped flying, he sheepishly emerges with most of his limbs intact, a realization that he wasn’t quite as hard as he thought he was and with the certain knowledge that she is still The Boss!

This is a 20×16 inch painting on canvas board. 

A quick sketch of Cassie lying on the table watching the birds through the window.

Charlie and Ming having a grooming session. Charlie seems to be doing all the work and Ming having all the fun.

Hemi, a brown spotted boy, Shelby, a snow marble girl and Rally, a brown marble boy, belong to Amy and Tyler Cross. How lucky they are to have three such beautiful and yet such different Bengals.  

I started with sketches of them together and once we had one we liked I moved on to the canvas. The painting will be 22×16 inches when it’s finished.

The three of them are sketched loosely onto the canvas.

The under painting is developing, the cats have a bit more form and the background is starting to go on.

Now the background is laid in and I’m starting to develop the cats themselves, especially their eyes.

I’m really enjoying painting these three beauties, I love the pose, I love the contrast between their different coats and especially the three sets of beautiful Bengal eyes, gold, green and blue. This photo shows their eyes well.

 And here is the finished painting. It’s many layers later and I’ve been gradually building up the colour in each of the cats, developing their fur and adding the shine on their coats.

Then there’s a period of fine tuning, emphasizing the shadows and tweaking the colour across the painting. Then I finished the red cushions, although they don’t come out well in digital photos. Then the final touch, whiskers!

Shelby

Rally

Hemi

And here’s a close up detail of the canvas….

   
Hemi’s beautiful green eyes.