Evil Squirrel: Painter of Lite
In the comments section of last week’s Saturday Squirrel post, Mental Mama asked me if I had any black squirrels in my neck of the woods. In this area, I have seen nothing but the run of the mill Eastern Grey Squirrels you know and love from all of my famously shitty 
photography, and I’ve never seen a black squirrel in person at all. Yes, as I sciurine expert, I know that black furred squirrels are just a mutation of the Eastern Grey.
However, a black squirrel has played into one of my very short-lived artistic endeavors that I took up four years ago.
In June 2010, one of my co-workers at Mecca took a weeklong trip up north to Canada. As usual, he and his wife took a lot of pictures, and even more usual, he made sure to share those pictures with everyone in the breakroom whether we wanted to see them or not. As he was going through the huge stack of pictures that followed the same predictable trend… monument, him in front of the monument, her in front of the monument, both in front of the monument, repeat for the next monument… all of a sudden, this photo materialized:
Black is beautiful. (Photo credit: Trang Gauen)
Whoa! I made him stop the manual slide show and go back to the squirrel picture so I could take a good look at it. I asked him if he could send me a copy of the digital image of this picture. He thought I was nuts, but he did it.
So I was now the proud owner of a Canadian black squirrel photo! But what I really wanted this black beauty for was as a subject for my brief attempt to learn how to paint with acrylics. When I say brief, I mean my Apple Barrel phase lasted a grand total of three paintings I did over six weeks…
My bizarre first attempt that featured a feral version of my character Hooly holding her trademark dandelion sunflower…
The artist who painted this dreck deserves to starve.
Ody may be my go-to model cat these days, but it was his late brother Spilly who stayed still long enough for me to try using him as my second subject…
Awwww, I miss him!
And then finally, the Canadian black squirrel from my friend’s vacation…
Not bad for a third attempt… but not good enough for me to decided to bother painting a fourth picture.
And thus ended my mercifully short flirtation with painting. And it also ends this week’s edition of The Joy of Saturday Squirrels.
Have a happy little weekend everyone!
Aw, he’s kinda cute 🙂
Yes, and he looks a lot more approachable than my guys do!
I’ve heard Canadians are quite friendly, eh?
yes! black is beautiful! and this guy is extra beautiful!
He’s no silvermistygrey, but he’ll do in a pinch! 😉
We have more and more of the all-blacks here in Syracuse, ESN. I think they are trying to start a South African rugby squad or something. I like your artist’s depiction. Very nice.
Oh, I could just see a bunch of squirrels getting into a scrum now… someone would probably get their nuts bitten in the pile…
Don’t those rugby balls kind of remind you of an acorn?
That’s it, you need to paint me a picture! Yay!
How about a crayola drawing to hang on the icebox?
Very cute. Your third attempt is quite accurate. The others are really nice too.
Thanks! The squirrel did come out the best of the bunch. I think I progressed faster learning to paint than I did learning to draw on the computer, but drawing on the computer is so much less messy and time consuming!
I think your paintings are really good. I think we have as many black squirrels here as grey or brown ones. It’s a pretty integrated area.
Thank you! I wish we had a nice multicultural mix of squirrels around here…
It is school hols here and we are off to Barwon Heads. You are seriously talented ES, The eyes look incredibly expressive and have life in them.
Thank you! Have fun at Barwon Heads without me! 🙂
Your paintings are good! Persevere.
In this country, the goal is to see a red squirrel – grey squirrels came over from your neck of the woods a long time ago and have all but wiped out our poor little native species 😦
Yes, I’ve been familiar with that story for a long time. I wish there was a solution to that problem that would benefit both species…
I have one – round up all the greys and send them to your back yard!
I’m still gonna try to get you a photo of one our neighborhood critters, just been staying inside today – it’s too damn hot.
It’s probably too damn hot for the squirrels too… especially the ones with that heat absorbing black fur. I’d be more than happy to show off an ebony squirrel if you manage to get a picture of one!
I had to laugh the other day. My Mom and I went for a walk around the neighbourhood. We were walking by a driveway when a large squirrel nest fell and two squirrels each made a run for it in opposite directions – one gray and one black. I was amazed they weren’t hurt – it was quite a fall! We both jumped!
Squirrels are built tough! That would have been so cute to see!
You should take up the painting again. Acrylic dries fast, so it’s not that time consuming (in comparison to say, watercolour), and it’s only messy if you drip the stuff everywhere! You’re damn good at it, ES, my good man!
Thank you! I just might try to paint something again someday….
Why not today? No time like the present, after all!!