Auction Commission: Introducing Tipperary

In April of 2012, Global Sighthound Rescue ran an artist auction offering the services of seven artists to create a "portrait" of each winner's pet. The mediums used by each artist varied greatly: linocut print, ceramic sculpture, paper mache, soft sculpture, graphite portrait, painted ceramic pottery, and myself... batik.

The winner of my auction is Susan who has owned many dogs, from many different breeds, as well as cats. Obviously a woman with a lot of love in her heart to share with so many. The process of choosing WHICH pet to feature in the batik caused Susan much uncertainty.

Initially, Susan told me she had a greyhound who is a trancer. Trancing... what the heck is that!! To my surprise, some greys seem to go into a trance when they brush their back against low hanging branches or bushes. They may actually stand motionless for several minutes with their eyes glazed over as they seem to be feeling the touch of the branches.

In reference to this behavior, Susan asked me if I could do a sketch of her three greyhounds peering out of a liliac bush. I began with a simple sketch and found, though I loved the idea of using brilliant colors, that the dog's beautiful face was getting lost in the busyness of the liliacs. To add two more greyhounds to this didn't seem like an option.

After looking through many pictures, we finally agreed that Tipperary would be the subject of the batik. Susan comments about her heart dog, "Much as I love the others, he (Tipperary) was and always will be Mommy's favorite."

To create the perfect composition that shows the pet's personality in addition to his visage, I had to find out more about who Tipperary was.

Tipperary was Susan's first greyhound
whom passed away in 2005 at age 11.

Tipperary was a lovely black male greyhound with gorgeous, engaging eyes. Susan wrote me "He was not a needy or demanding dog, but he always made it clear that I was very important to him. He watched me wherever I went, but did not have to follow me everywhere. It's probably why I liked his eyes so much." THAT statement gave me my focus!

Despite the fact that Tipperary was afraid of thunderstorms, fireworks, balloons, and black plastic bags, he was better known for being a precocious scamp.

Susan wrote, "He did seem to have a taste for the written word. He ate many newspapers and books through the years. He also was a manic chocoholic. When we visited my parents, he found and ate selectively from her chocolate stash in the bedroom. She learned to hide her chocolate better whenever he came to visit." THOSE statements gave me my composition.

Since then, I have found the reference materials I need to convey my idea, sketched out an image (that I love and whose subsequent batik I will sadly not be able to keep), done a color study, transferred the image onto the fabric ( I choose a lovely French cotton with Snails embedded in it), and I am now at the beginning stages of waxing.

Tipperary has such fine white lines in his black face that I decided to try using my Ukranian Easter Egg tjanting tool, which I have never used before in a batik (see white areas in the closeup image around the eye). It was working fabuously until I realized that these lines would have to be redone during each subsequent wax removal and reapplication. It was best if I had started with the background.

Traditionally in my work process, I always underplan and wait to see how the subject of the batik turns out before I decide what kind of background "speaks" to me and what colors are appropriate. Now I am forced to work in reverse. I decided that a retro pattern seemed to suit the theme of this batik, Tipperary's avid chocoholicism.

Given many of these factors, I have entitled this batik "Chocolate, Snails, and Puppy Dog Tails... That's what Tipperary is Made Of"