Commissions - a reflection

As I currently have no painting commissions currently I decided to look back at some of my work from the past few years.

This was one of my first commissions i received back when I was at university studying fine art. A friend i was like with approached me asking whether I would like to paint her mother. As it turns out her mother had seen my work when visiting and liked my style. Ironically I was not really a portrait artist at the time and focused more on abstract expressionism. I decided to accept the challenge anyway and the above piece was created. I was fortunate that her mother loved it and as a starving art student the cash was an added bonus to stretching myself out of my comfort zone.

After completing university I got a request from a partially sighted lady I looked after to paint her old guide dog who had passed away. This was a new challenge for me as I had never attempted a dog portrait before. She had asked someone else too and they said they would charge her a three figure sum. I offered a much smaller two figure sum as I thought it was much fairer.

This was the result. From this piece I had several more people enquire about my work. All enquiries where to do with painting pets. Out of nowhere I had become a pet portrait artist...

So long abstract expressionism, for now anyway.

Most people wanted dogs but I did get approached to paint a beloved tabby cat. Yet again I had never painted this subject before and at this time I was working a seven day week, 14 hours a day. She was so eager to have a painting from me that she said she was willing to wait however long it would take.

Three months later and a lot of late nights I produced this for her. I am proud of this painting as it involved many layers and really caught the personality of the cat.

As the years have gone by I feel more confident with my work but it a labour of love. I find it hard to promote myself and find myself shying away from my skill when asked. I hate snobbery and I am certainly not egotistical about what I do, but I have learnt that to be successful you have to have self belief to achieve dreams.

I may only earn pocket money from my work but for me art should be available for everyone. I love painting and making people smile at what I create for them.