Custom Toy Portrait » duck

Bunny, Bunny, Quack Quack, and Mr. Elephant

Custom Toy Portrait — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 20:59:16 +0000

11″x14″ acrylic, 2010. Sharon has 3 children with four favorite toys between them. There are two “Bunnies,” the largest belonging to five-year-old Luke. The second “Bunny” and “Quack Quack” are three-year-old Lilah’s blanket animals. “Mr. Elephant” belongs to 8-month-old Daniel. Sharon commissioned this portrait of the entire group to hang in her own bedroom! I love this idea — it’s like a sort of symbolic, metaphorical portrait of her children.

Dottie

Custom Toy Portrait — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 04:54:35 +0000

8″x10″ acrylic, 2009. Ahh, another filet-o-stuffed animal blanket! I am beginning to feel like a neglectful parent since my own child does not have one of these things… they clearly inspire passionate devotion in those lucky children who possess them. Here is Dottie, a cute duck/blanket belonging to Avery, draped luxuriously over a cushion. See portraits of other blanket/animals here, here, and here.

Dog and Duck Blankies

Custom Toy Portrait — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 00:23:55 +0000

8″x10″ acrylic on canvas, 2009. Lily’s very clever mom had back-ups of these two, so she was able to send me the actual stuffed animals to paint from! It was a challenging project for a couple of reasons. First, these are tiny stuffed heads attached to what are essentially fileted flying squirrel. Each one consists of a square of fabric with a tiny foot at each of three corners and the head at the fourth. My sister insisted that I should depict them fully spread out and flying against a blue sky, which would have been awesome, but just not my style. Second, they are very, very soft and have lovely placid expressions… I could barely stay awake in their presence!