“Out of Sight Hound” is a painting I was determined to include in this show against all odds, the challenge being finding a model. I have a whippet mix myself, but I knew I couldn’t possibly use him for the piece if I intended to sell it. I tried working with several breeders, but was strung along and then dropped at every turn. A friend who is well-connected in the world of “dog people” suggested that breeders are anxious about how their prize-winners might be portrayed by an artist. In the UK, where I have friends with sighthounds, I’d have had little problem with this, but in the US, these beautiful dogs are uncommon. Finally I found a woman who runs a local doggy daycare who happens to have three greyhounds and who was excited for me to work from her canine companions. Sir, her oldest greyhound, a racetrack rescue, became the model for this piece.

“Out of Sight Hound” is part of my pattern series, in which I reduce the subject to a silhouetted, stamp-like form, and repeat that shape to create a background pattern, pitting the animal against a mass-produced image of itself. With the inescapable pop art references, one is reminded of Andy Warhol’s soup cans or Wayne Theibauld’s regimented displays of puddings. In this case, the well-mannered poise the dog displays in the main image is belied by the miniatures trotting anxiously about behind him, which hint at the phenomenal energy coiled in his lithe frame, just waiting to be sprung by an unlucky hare.