I don't put many of my animal portraits and drawings on this site because I save them for my portrait website www.ptarlow.com and my Facebook Phyllis Tarlow Portraits page. I'm showing it on this site for a short while because it will be up for sale Wed. - Sat., June 23-26, 2010, during the Art for Animals/Animals in Art fund raiser for Pet Rescue and the Mamaroneck Artists Guild, a co-op gallery I belong to for the last 25 or more years. To get the details see my Events Section.

Animals rank right up there with landscapes as favorite subjects. Most often they are painted or drawn as commissions for people who love their pets or have lost a pet. This vizsla painting came about when I met a lovely woman at a dog show who raises vizslas and trains them for field competitions. This is one of her champions. It is available through www.fineartamerica.com/phyllistarlow as a framed or unframed print.

I have plans for new paintings which will include animals within the landscape.

Every few years it seems, a major challenge comes along that either changes the course of my life or puts a big stumbling block in the way of the orderly, gradual progression that my life had been following at that time.

That's been the case in the last two years with this year being particularly difficult. Not only has the economy had an effect on sales of my landscape paintings but I've been called on to set aside my work entirely a number of times to come to my daughter's aid as she deals with a life threatening condition. Usually, I can't wait to get outside in the Spring and paint en plein air. This year, I'm finding that I'm actually preferring to move back toward portrait commissions and studio work because of the many interruptions to my painting life and the lowered energy I'm able to set aside for art work at a time that I'm leaving for days at a time to be with my daughter.

I'm posting this painting that I delighted in painting last Fall at the Boscobel Restoration site in Garrison and hope to get back there soon. In the meantime, I'm working on two dog portraits in oil and enjoying the fact that I can work on them as time and energy allows and on any day with no concern for the weather. Since I love the wonderful personalities that shine through as I focus on animal portraits, I'm happy to work on these commissions. I'll post them as I finish them.