My horse Zeuss at feedtime

I have to get a video of him. he always makes me laugh. I whinny at him and he gets all excited and whinnies his head off up and down the scales and turns little 360's and shakes his head..
He still looks pretty good for a 21year old!  Goes well too. lol's sounds like a car ...

I will be painting at the Autumn Arts bazaar Sunday 9th March at Lake Macquarie art gallery grounds on beautiful Lake Macqaurie

Not this Sunday but the next - 10-3pm. Come along and say hello!
 I think I will be painting the portrait for the portrait exhibition as I don't think I will have time otherwise!

I'm doing the sketches for Penta , Raven & Kestral. See the earlier portraits I've created for Carol.

I have started doing sketches for a 3 up portrait for Carol. Carol has a dog training business
http://www.shadowhawk.com.au/
She has about 12 or more dogs she wants to immortalise. Some have passed on others current. I have created 2 portraits already so this will be the third. They will all be on the one wall so I am keeping a reasonably common background scheme.
This one will be off Penta , Kestrel and Raven and will be an Oil on a 35 x 70cms gallery wrap canvas like the others.
Here's a link to the creation of the 2 previous portraits I've created for her. http://www.suelinton.com.au/pages/creationrexhawkandgrizzly.htm

 Here is the first one I created - Rex , Hawk and Grizzly. 

Rescue mission

We've had some really hot weather lately and it's very dry - we desperately need some rain.

I came out one hot day and saw this little kingfisher twitching on the ground being eaten by ants. He must have been heatstruck and flopped on the ground.
I didn't know they lived up here .I thought it was too dry.
I picked him up , brushed the ants off and took him inside and put him underneath the aircon. We were going to ring wires ( wildlife people) but after 30mins he started to perk up a bit. After an hour or so we thought he would be ok so we took him out and here he is sitting on the verandah ready to go. He took a while but eventually flew off. My good deed for the day..

— feeling happy.

A memorial portrait of Mr Shirt

Here is one of my secret Xmas portraits - a memorial portrait
 

Mr Shirt
23 x 23cms image size
framed pastel
'Your work is phenomenal!'
Marshall
Marshall received a memorial portrait of his Old Staffy 'Staff ' last Xmas . He was so touched he thought a similar gift of a portrait of Shirt for his son would be much loved.Shirt passed away last year.

 His son really loved the portrait and was also deeply moved by the portrait.

A pastel portrait of Jimmy

 

Jimmy is a Staffy X Cattledog who's 17 and Leanne wanted a portrait created while he was still around. He was a secret Xmas present.

Jimmy 

30 x 40cm image size

Framed Pastel 

 

'Jimmy is still alive and kicking. 

Leigh loved the portrait. He was extremely impressed.'

Leanne

 
 

 

Here he is in the studio to give you an idea of the size of the portrait.

Meet me on TV!

NBN TV came out and did a segment on my portrait painting.

New website on the way for 2014!

I'm busy building a new website for 2014.
 It's been an extreme learning curve!
There were a few times when the computer was almost fisbeed across the room but I'm coming out the other side and really enjoying it.lol's
It will be more modern and easier to navigate. If you haven't seen my current one have a look -
 www.suelinton.com.au

Koda the Fox

Here's an early Xmas portrait Koda the fox
18 x 25cms image
Framed Pastel
'Candice and the guys gave me Koda (the fox's) portrait last night and it's amazing! You really captured her perfectly. Thank you so much.'
Alicia

Xmas greetings!

The last of my Xmas portraits has been delivered. 3 will be presented tomorrow so I'm keen to hear how they go.
I'm having a short break from portraits and I'm now redoing my website. It's a bigger job than doing the murals! lol's
Hopefully I can have the new website up and running in the next month or so. It should be a lot easier to use and prettier.. I'll be after some user feedback when I put it up but I'll let you know when the time comes. Happy Xmas!
 I'll be in and out of the studio a bit over the next fortnight but you should be able to catch me if you leave a message.

Newcastle Herald photos of the Art Bazaar on the weekend.

 There is a great photo of me demonstrating.



http://www.theherald.com.au/story/1959002/art-bazaar-in-civic-park-photos/?cs=310#slide=1

I'm painting at the Summer Arts Bazaar 9-3pm tomorrow Saturday 7th Dec - Civic Park Newcastle

I'm packed for the Art Bazaar at Civic Park Newcastle tomorrow.Still not sure what I'll be painting. I have a cat's face in Oil as one idea but at the moment I may just finish off Chloe the rottweiler.
The problem will be making sure I make her portrait colourful enough. The problem with working out of doors in public is that if it looks ok outdoors in bright light it will look drab inside with normal light.
I'll have to go with very vibrant outdoors with the demo so in more subdued light it will still look interesting. That's a bit scary as I know it will look better inside but passersby will probably think it's a bit much! lol's
Come along and have a look!

Remi the Rottweiler

The original reference photo.
 I don't often show the photo reference as I tend to ad lib a bit and often use several photos to come up with your ideal portrait.
 Your  portrait will look like your pet but may not look exactly like the photo.
The photo was lovely but not very sharp.
I wanted the portrait to be more alive and colourful than the photo and for her to be the star so I downplayed her collar.
I generally check to see if you are ok for me to make your portrait more colourful. I can do a copy of the photo but I feel my method generally improves on the photo! 

The finished portrait.
Remi's portrait is an engagement present.  
She is a 20 x 25cms image size Pastel

The custom framed portrait ready to hang.

Zeuss & I

Some pics from 2009 when he was in regular work of 2 1/2hr arena sessions a week. I haven't had any photos taken lately and he isn't as ' fit' but last ride he went beautifully so I will have to get some more taken. He is 21 years old now and I've had him since he was 6 years old.

 Above - start of our half pass

 Below - a canter up the track back to the paddock

 A few months ago

 Winter coat

 Checking him out in the mirror..Is he going as well as he feels?

 Below - after the ride I get him to stand untied while I unsaddle and then get him to follow me  ( free ) back to the paddock where he files in and then turns around to face me ready to be rugged etc. The first pic he is following me up to be unsaddled , the next he is unsaddled and going to the paddock..The last ( out of sequence) is him waiting to be unsaddled.He's free in  50 acres of the property.

 

Hunter Lifestyle Magazine article about the West Wallsend Heritage mural 2013

Here's the article the Oct / Nov Hunter Lifestyle Magazine published about the creation of the mural.

Text of the page is below

 

The text of page 2 + 3 is below - The italic font refers to the picture of the completed mural LHS

Photos from the weekend exhibition at Ogishi Glass

Our exhibition was in the front building - 3 artists - me , Julie Lau + Karen Malmgren. I demonstrated on the front verandah.
Below left to right
 Julie Lau , Me ( Sue Linton) + Karen Malmgren _ maybe not the most flattering pic of us but the one where we all looked a little happy - that's where a painting is better than a photo! You can pick the best photo of everyone and put them together for the ideal portrait .lol's
 

 Julie with one of her paintings

 Karen with some of her's

 Your's truly acting the goat as usual..lol's

I'll be demonstrating at Ogishi Glass today so come and say hello!

My realistic recreation of the painting of Caractacus English Derby Winner 1862

  Malcolm & Jenny came up from Sydney to see the portrait I'd created from their 1860's photo of the painting of English Derby winner Caractacus. 
One of their relatives was the trainer of the horse.They used to have a print of the painting but sold it years ago. Recently they saw that the original painting had sold in England on the antique show ' Flog it" for c 3100 english pounds. They decided they'd like a copy back in the family and sought me out to recreate a more lifelike version of the original. The original painting was done by an anonymous artist and was in a quite a stylised and naive style.The reference photo was taken from a video still from the TV show so it wasn't that clear.

 Above - the original painting by an anonymous 1800's artist

Above -  My recreation
Caractacus
60 x 84 cms
Framed size Oil

 Malcolm with the portrait

 The finished portrait with my suggested frame . I will frame the portrait in the next week or so.

 I found it an interesting and challenging task. I made the horse more realistic but kept the people similar to the ones in the painting but a bit more in proportion and real.
Malcolm and Jenny were very pleased with the result.
'I can't take my eyes off the painting '
Jennifer

'It fits the bill and looks very period'
Malcolm

I was to have Caractacus in an 1800's English rural setting - so no bright sunny skies like over here! 
 Here is the painting hung .
  

 The photo above is more typical of the colour of the portrait but this one shows the frame better.

Exhibition and demonstrations this weekend 19-20th Oct