English springer spaniel portrait

Home

Contact

the artist 's

"English springer spaniel portrait "

springer spaniel painting--.>

At the Game Fair 2005 in Belvoir Castle UK, one minute after the opening, a visitor rushed in, while I was about to deep my toast in my breakfast cofee.. ( I know that I shouldn't do that ! .. but it's so good ). He had the last "sporting gun magazine" open on a page where there was a photo of my painting with a springer. In fact, just the head of the dog.
"I want the same painting, but with my dog on it", he said

Unfortunately, his sprinegr was dead and the few photos he had kept of his gun dog was in rather poor quality. The dog's head was about 5x5cm and he wanted a 20x30cm portrait.

Here is the reference photo and the portrait. Real scale

I scanned this numeric photo, and played with lightness and contrast with Photoshop, trying to enhance the reflected colors of the fur. The results were rather poor, but I knew I could invent a lot of interesting details.

From a very uniform chocolate springer, I created a portrait, where the golden or red-haired reflections were opposed to violet-blue.

It's amusing to compare details of this portrait with the same view on my last dog portraits. Same style !
Strong colors and amazing details..
Look in this springer's eye, you can see the photographer

my client's comments

Dear Cyrille,
I have just checked my email again and there he was, my heart almost stopped. Fantastic! Its him to a tea, eyes,grin and spirit are all there. Colour is excellent and the hair detail is amazing. I have a big smile on my face, i cannot describe the emotion that it has brought me. Thank you very much for bringing him almost back to life. I will be so proud to show the painting to my friends. i cannot wait to see the real thing.

On the left: details of the painting "deer hunter"

On the right: details of the Korthal of the watercolor lesson

Underneath: my very first springer portrait

February 2001, as I was exhibiting in Gant (Belgium), I noticed a visitor spending at least half an hour in front of my dog paintings.
When he left, he promised me he 'll come back. On sunday, my visitor came back and spent an hour with me. Six months later, exhibiting in Knokke, the elegant seaside resort in Belgium, he appeared again the first day and came back twice. Each time with new photos of his springer spaniel, but they were never good enough for me.

One day, he came with his dog.
5 minutes later, I had 4 perfect photos to paint a good portrait.

Read this page to learn how to take good photos of your pet: advices

I lost the reference photo but this one was taken right after.
reflects and glance are lightly different

It's an interesting portrait... even if nowaday I would have painted it a bit differently.

When I showed this portrait to one of my friends, she exclaimed :
- "Oh ! It is a Dürer !"
- "No, Madame, it is a Jübert !" ... I did not take offense of it ... but she could at least remember my name ! pfffffttt !.

Here are the details of the fur. Do I have to tell you it's just watercolour ?

You can now have a look at this painting with a springer spaniel , "deer hunter ".
or follow the guided tour