Carrie’s Painting of the Week
Lulu
It’s been quite a while since I’ve made a painting for the Art for Shelter Animals Project, and so it felt really good to make this one. Plus, it gave me a much-needed break from interviewing, covering and writing about people and events in Montville. (Anyone want to check out the Montville Patch, the site that I run? Click here).
Lulu is a dog I met through work. She was dropped at the shelter, pregnant, with what must have been her 20th litter (or more), judging by the sag and droop of her breasts. She had a litter of nine puppies in the shelter, and they are all spoken for. Lulu is up for adoption, herself, and really needs to go to a home where she will be loved and treated well and treasured. Maybe this home will make up for how hard the rest of her life has been.
She has had to have an operation, a mastectomy, I believe, after one of her much-used teats became infected. But she is up and around, and can be adopted soon. I am going to give the animal control officer the painting tomorrow.
That’s the way the Art for Shelter Animals Project works. Artists from around the world have joined in, all making portraits of animals in their local shelters, or with local rescue groups, and then donating the portraits to the shelter or rescue group. The shelter can do whatever it wants with the paintings. It’s a fun, fascinating project – anyone who wants to join in, just let me know!
Making art to give away is an incredibly liberating experience. It was through the ASAP that I began to experiment with colors and textures – I felt free and unafraid (at first I typed “unarfraid,” which actually seems like the right word…) – free and unafraid, and why not? The group receiving the portrait was going to love it, no matter what, so the specter of “bad” or “wrong” simply vanished.
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