A Bit of Bull….

Most of the snow has melted and gardening season has begun, so much of my free time is spent toiling out in the dirt. I decided to set up a new still life – one with no fresh flowers to die! I’d found this ceramic bull a few years back and was in the mood to use him in a painting. He was kind of tricky to draw in. Yesterday I drew him in with gray paint and tried to address the shadows and muscles, etc. A kind of “grisalle” (sp?) to see if I could get it right before committing to color. Here’s how he looked yesterday:

Years ago I was in Mexico with a group, hunting edible mushrooms on inactive volcanos. One day we got to visit a bull ranch where they raised bulls for bull-fighting. A bull had fallen down and the rest of them were in the process of goring it to death. “That’s just what they do,” the rancher said. Still gives me the shivers!