Rural means there are ungulates

I came across a group hugging the fence by the path. Sometimes they’re steers – neutered males being raised for the meat market, other times they’re cows turned out onto grass after a winter indoors on hay, a move that improves the quality of their milk and probably pleases them a great deal too. I was once in a field with my dog when about 30 of these lasses suddenly appeared at the far corner, kicking, dancing, and galumphing joyfully and terrifyingly towards me. We ran for the stile and got there just before the girls did.

The subject of my painting though was safely on the other side of a barbed wire fence so I was able to take a photo without personal jeopardy and when I find it again, I’ll post it here. For compositional purposes, I took two cows and a clutter of legs out of the image and made a rough sketch on A1 cartridge.

I should say at this point that I’ve never drawn a cow before and it’s hard to describe what a puzzle their facial features are.

I’ve definitely found drawing into a painting with soft pastel or just plain charcoal helps me find and expose lines. This cow is kinda looking straight at me but simultaneously looking slightly to one side. Her eyes are sideways on too, and at a slight tilt, so marking those shapes out helped me get a feel of the whole. Painting them in subsequently was easier although that mouth and the angle of the eyes has given me (is still giving me) huge problems.

Painted in, there’s an outward bulge to her face which isn’t matched on the other side. Is this my error or is her head angle creating it? Thank goodness for photos. I’m happier with her mouth than I was and once I’ve got the shape set, I’ll remove the lipstick. The calf was a doddle as there’s not much of it on show. I’d turned it into a demon though with the shape of its eye and, prompted by this into a narrative whereby each of them is cognisant of their situation, I’ve narrowed its mother’s eyes too and leaned their expression towards cold contempt for the viewer whose only concern is how they’ll taste. The golden calf, a biblical symbol of idolatry, represents wealth which, in its own right, can do nothing, feed nothing, comfort nothing without conversion into well-directed action. Looking at you, Tech Bros.

6th May.

So now I’ve fined down the cow’s muzzle, muted the gold of the calf, and used soft pastel as a highlight and deliberate drawing element to cross the line from bucolic field scene to something slightly threatening. The eyes are designed to hold all of the threat message by being ‘not quite right’ in that no cow in a field has ever appeared in part-cartoon form.

What I’m mulling over now is the background which I muted slightly and now I think I prefer the original. But it’s still wet and the light is peculiar so I’ll give it a bit of time.