Siamese Kitten - Lacey Secord

This is our new kitten, Lacey. She is eight weeks old and is called a "Lynx Point" Siamese. This is actually a breed in Great Britain, but in America it is simply a color variation of the Siamese cat. The Lynx Point color was established by breeding a Siamese with a Tabby. With Lacey, she has the classic tabby markings which are circular rather than striped.

Lacey was adopted through "Cats in Need" a local cat rescue organization. She was pulled out of a local animal shelter, along with her brother, by this rescue organization. One of my friends ended up adopting her orange tabby brother when she went to visit Lacey at the foster home with me!!

I'm looking forward to using Lacey as a model in my future paintings! To see some of my current cat paintings please go to my website at http://www.dawnsecord.com/ and click on the cat art gallery.

Have a great day!

Irish Setter Family Painting

This painting was commissioned as a family tribute. The owners of the dogs live in a beautiful log cabin in Virginia.

There were eight Irish Setter puppies in the litter. I had taken over 100 photos of the puppies playing so there would a large selection of poses for the composition. Ultimately 41 photos of the pups were printed and laid out on my living room floor to finalize the composition. It was important that each puppy be interactive in the painting so that the viewer found themselves being led from one dog to another. Another 15 photos were printed out of the cabin and the parents. When working on a large multi-subject project such as this it is helpful for me to lay photos out to visualize the final composition.

For the cabin - most of the photos had been taken in the winter while the trees were dormant. There was one photo supplied that showed the summer colors and trees full. In the summer photo the colors of the horizon were breathtaking and it was so much fun to capture the colors behind the trees.

Lastly, and very important to me, was the American flag blowing in the breeze on the front porch. My husband and I are very patriot and we were thrilled to see the flag in the photos.

The painting is 20" x 30" and an extremely rewarding project. I hope you enjoy viewing the painting as much as I had painting it. On my website, there is an Irish Setter painting featuring five puppies playing that is available in limited edition giclee prints.

Dawn Secord

Loving Life

Our Irish Setter, Monet, is 15 months old. She has so much to teach us if we would only stop, look and listen.

She begins each day with a wagging tail and a positive attitude. She inspires me to be unaffected by negative influences. She is a constant reminder to be happy and enjoy life to the fullest. She makes me smile and laugh all day long.

Irish Setter Greeting Cards

Recently I finished this painting of an Irish Setter. Each year when my husband and I attend the ISCA National Specialty my goal is to come out with a new image of a setter on greeting cards.

The originating photograph was taken by a professional photograher. Permission was obtained to use the photograph for reference material to paint a portrait for the owners of the dog. I loved the pose of the dog, she is so beautiful and regal, and the fun blues used as the background color were a flattering compliment to her coloring. This was the ideal piece of my artwork to put into greeting cards this year. The photographer was contacted and permission was extended to use his image not only for the painting but for the painting to then be put on my greeting cards.

Thank you to all parties involved for being supportive of these new greeting cards. The cards may be purchased from my website at http://www.dawnsecord.com/.

Buzzy the Thoroughbred

Buzzy's portrait was just completed. Buzzy had been a race track horse and is now used for competitive riding.

I took over 100 photos when photographing him for a portrait. His owner had me take photos of him in his English bridle, posing with their dog, standing freely and running in the arena. The photos were taken mid morning and the sun was just peeking over the hills and had cast back lighting on Buzzy as he ran towards me. The natural lighting effect was spectacular and ultimately played a large role in which photo was chosen to be painted. He is a very kind horse with an edge of energy. This painting shows both sides of him.