Michelle Wrighton Fine Art and Photography

‘Donnybrook Rose’ was a joy to paint, quite mesmerizing to paint the sweep and flow of the gentle curves reminiscent of a roses delicate petals.  Dark purples, magenta, plum and red violets contrast beautifully against the rich gold, copper and pale blue reminiscent of the iridescent sheen on a Ulysses Butterfly’s wings.

Modern contemporary floral art painting by Michelle Wrighton

This original art painting, like many modern abstract art pieces, is best viewed in a large size to appreciate the full depth of colours and texture of the brushstrokes.

Please click the image below to purchase Greeting Cards and a range of Fine Art Canvas and Framed Prints of this painting.

Clothing, coffee mugs, drinkware, notebooks and a selection of unique gift items featuring this and other artwork can be purchased from my Zazzle store.

‘Donnybrook Rose’ is available to buy as a framed print, greeting card, or matted, mounted, laminated or canvas print: Purchase “DonnyBrook Rose”

“Donnybrook Rose’ is available to buy as a poster, mousepad, prints, coffee mug, t-shirt and gift items: Purchase “Donnybrook Rose”

If ‘Donnybrook Rose’ would suit your interior decor and you would like to purchase a  unique hand painted and embellished canvas print of ‘Donnybrook Rose’  please contact me for pricing and purchase options.  Contemporary images using different colour schemes can also be created to your requirements.

A few people have asked recently how I create my digital paintings so I thought I would write a post with some work in progress images to show how I paint.

There are a number of ways to create art in a digital format, there really is no right or wrong way, it is all up to the individual artist.  My background is a lifetime spent working with traditional art materials – graphite, charcoal, colour pencils, pastels, acrylics and oils – and I utilize all this experience and knowledge I have gained working with traditional art mediums to paint digitally.  I use a Wacom Intuos 4 digital graphics tablet and electronic art pen and the powerful real media emulation program Corel Painter XI to literally paint just like I do with traditional mediums, just electronically.  The Painter program allows me to choose the type of medium (charcoal, pastels, watercolours, oils etc), the size and type of brush and blenders I wish to use, as well as the support I want to paint on such as canvas, sanded pastel papers, watercolour papers etc.

All of these variables respond just as they do with real life mediums in regards to the application, mixing and blending of colour.  The pressure sensitive tablet and pen records not only the movement of the pen (digital paintbrush) as I move my hand, but also the angle I hold the pen at, as well as the pressure that I apply to make each mark – essentially all of the variables that make a particular mark with traditional art materials are duplicated by the amazing technology that I have available to use.

The biggest difference for me between painting digitally and painting traditionally are all positive – the lack of mess, no wasted time setting up, lack of fumes & toxic ingredients (an important factor when you have auto-immune issues), no paintbrushes to clean, no wasted paint, no running out of the perfect colour mix, being able to paint for five minutes at a time if that is all I have available or if I unexpectedly get interrupted.  Probably more important to me personally as an artist though, is that painting digitally has allowed my creativity to flourish in a way that has never happened with traditional art mediums – I put this down to working photo realistically which is very time consuming and mentally draining.

With digital painting I am free to follow the slightest hint of inspiration for trying something new, knowing that I can always go back to the last saved copy if that particular path of inspiration comes to a dead end.  This is certainly not something I ever tried with traditional mediums for fear of completely destroying dozens of hours of work on a painting.  LOL so I should probably add ‘liberating’ to the list of reasons that I love digital painting so much!

There is so much more that I could write about digital painting, but I will leave that for another post!

This is a painting I finished recently of a lovely grey arab photographed by fellow artist, Cathy Sheeter.  I havn’t given this one a title yet, so if you have any good ideas, I would love to hear them!

Finished digital painting of a grey arab horse, © 2010 Michelle Wrighton

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‘Summer Heat’ is an original painting based on a photo I took of my Standardbred gelding Tommy in our back paddock last summer.  I avoided putting too much detail in the painting and chose warm yellow and orange hues to really capture the feeling of a hot summers day in rural Australia.

Summer Heat – modern contemporary equine art by Michelle Wrighton

Summer Heat – Close up

Please click the image below to purchase Greeting Cards and a range of Fine Art Canvas and Framed Prints of this painting.

Clothing, coffee mugs, drinkware, notebooks and a selection of unique gift items featuring this and other artwork can be purchased from my Zazzle store.

‘Summer Heat’ is available for sale as art prints and gifts items in my Redbubble and Zazzle shops, and signed prints are available for sale in my Etsy shop Art By Michelle

I’ve always loved working with dark coloured and black backgrounds to create dramatic lighting in a painting.  Colour Pencils and pastels are two traditional mediums that this technique works extremely well with, and I am pleased to say that it is the same for paintings created with digital pastels.  It takes an awful lot of self control for me to stop adding more and more detail to a painting (traditional or digital), but I am loving exploring painting more freely and expressively while still capturing the essence of my subject, so I can see a few more of this style of painting in the future.

The Dark Horse – Michelle Wrighton © 2010

Please click the image below to purchase Greeting Cards and a range of Fine Art Canvas and Framed Prints of this painting.

A selected range of quality products including canvas prints, iPad cases, t-shirts, mousepads, notepads and many more gift items featuring the racehorse painting “Dark Horse” can be seen below and are now available for purchase.

 VIEW ALL PRODUCTS FEATURING “DARK HORSE”

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Thanks for visiting my blog  and sharing my art and photography with your family and friends!

x Michelle

Michelle Wrighton: Animal, Wildlife & Landscape Fine Art & Photography

FACEBOOK: Michelle Wrighton Artist

TWITTER: artistMichelleW

BUY CARDS, PHOTO PRINTS, CANVAS ART AND FRAMED ART PRINTS: Redbubble

Considering my normal subject material and style, how different is this one!

Boats at Harbour by Michelle Wrighton

As an animal and wildlife artist, I try to be bold with my colour choices while still retaining a high degree of realism, but I don’t usually get to enjoy using such explosive colour so paintings this one was an awful lot of fun! The fiery red reflections contrast against the cool blues and shades of turquoise greens in a way that would compliment a variety of modern contemporary interior designs.  Although painted as a single painting, I like it split up like the image shows as a triptych, but I think it would also work well as a four piece painting.  If two is a diptych, and three a triptych, I wonder what a four piece painting is called? I have absolutely no idea, so I better go google and find out!

Original abstract painting inspired by the colours and reflections of Fishing Boat Harbour in Fremantle, Western Australia.  Available for purchase printed with archival inks on ready to hang gallery wrapped canvas as well as glossy photographic prints for framing behind glass.

Thanks for visiting my blog  and sharing my art and photography with your family and friends!

x Michelle

Michelle Wrighton: Animal, Wildlife & Landscape Fine Art & Photography

FACEBOOK: Michelle Wrighton Artist

TWITTER: artistMichelleW

BUY CUSTOMIZED ART POSTERS, ART PRINTS, T-SHIRTS & GIFTS: Zazzle

BUY CARDS, PHOTO PRINTS, CANVAS ART AND FRAMED ART PRINTS: Redbubble

As we are still on super slow shaped internet access, I have made the most of my time and have been finishing off several old paintings that I had put aside, as well as completing some new ones – including the first of my ‘Inspired By’ pet paintings created from a photo submitted by one of the members of my Art Page on Facebook.  I’ve still got a few oil paintings to finish (GSD, Meerkat, Snow Leopard, Pug and a couple of others), but as they have been waiting since before we put our old house on the market at the end of 2008, I think they can hang on a bit longer until I get my new studio set up!

Here is another farm animal painting that I have just finished – this is Stuart, the Bantam Rooster. I love the iridescent colours that most roosters have in their feathers, its a shame that they are so darn noisy or I’d have more of them!  We had four roosters at one stage – the downside of buying and hand raising baby chicks – and all they would do all day was try and out-crow each other, day and night!

‘Stuart’ reproductions will be available for purchase in the near future.

‘Stuart’ Bantam Rooster by artist Michelle Wrighton

Please click the image below to purchase Greeting Cards and a range of Fine Art Canvas and Framed Prints of this painting.

Clothing, coffee mugs, drinkware, notebooks and a selection of unique gift items featuring this and other artwork can be purchased from my Zazzle store.

Thanks for visiting my blog  and sharing my art and photography with your family and friends!

x Michelle

Michelle Wrighton: Animal, Wildlife & Landscape Fine Art & Photography

FACEBOOK: Michelle Wrighton Artist

TWITTER: artistMichelleW

BUY CUSTOMIZED ART POSTERS, ART PRINTS, T-SHIRTS & GIFTS: Zazzle

BUY CARDS, PHOTO PRINTS, CANVAS ART AND FRAMED ART PRINTS: Redbubble

I met this gorgeous Dogue de Bordeaux some time ago at a dog show and new straight away that I would paint his portrait which I have finally managed to do.  Actually, I ainted him a while ago now, but I’m still playing catch up with my blog!  The Dogue de Bordeaux is still a rare breed, but most people will remember Tom Hanks’ co-star in the 1989 comedy “Turner & Hooch” and camera chomping dog in the Olympus Digital Camera advertising campaign.

Dogue de Bordeaux are believed to have originated in France over 600 years ago and are also known as the French Mastiff, Bordeaux dog, Bulldogue Francais, or simply DDB.  They were originally bred to hunt, guard and fight and these imposing, fearless dogs were popular protectors of the noble and wealthy.  Today, Dogue de Bordeaux are prized family companions for their loyal, devoted, playful and affectionate nature and sweet, balanced temperament and courage as a guard dog.

More information about this lovely breed can be obtained from the newly formed Dogue de Bordeaux Club of Australia.

Stormy Dogue – Dogue de Bordeaux painting by Michelle Wrighton

Please click the image below to purchase Greeting Cards and a range of Fine Art Canvas and Framed Prints of this painting.

Clothing, coffee mugs, drinkware, notebooks and a selection of unique gift items featuring this and other artwork can be purchased from my Zazzle store.

Greeting cards, laminated, matted, canvas and framed prints of “Stormy Dogue” can be purchased from my Redbubble giftshop:

A variety of other prints, tshirts, mousepads, coffee mugs and other items featuring ‘Stormy Dogue’ are available at my Zazzle giftshop.

Product selection from Zazzle

Thanks for visiting my blog  and sharing my art and photography with your family and friends!

x Michelle

Michelle Wrighton: Animal, Wildlife & Landscape Fine Art & Photography

FACEBOOK: Michelle Wrighton Artist

TWITTER: artistMichelleW

BUY CUSTOMIZED ART POSTERS, ART PRINTS, T-SHIRTS & GIFTS: Zazzle

BUY CARDS, PHOTO PRINTS, CANVAS ART AND FRAMED ART PRINTS: Redbubble

Tommy is one of our most favourite boys, a gentle giant that is inquisitive all of the time and loves a cuddle and a scratch from anyone willing to give one.

Tommy – Standardbred Horse Painting by Michelle Wrighton

Please click the image below to purchase Greeting Cards and a range of Fine Art Canvas and Framed Prints of this painting.

Clothing, coffee mugs, drinkware, notebooks and a selection of unique gift items featuring this and other artwork can be purchase from my Zazzle store.

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My second entry for the Canine Art Guild’s ‘Helping Paws’ online Exhibition is my charcoal pet portrait painting of “Noble” the German Shepherd Dog. “Noble” seemed like a very appropriate choice to exhibit in an exhibition titled “Helping Paws” considering the number of GSD’s around the world that lend their paws to help people in need in many different situations including the Police force, military, search and rescue and service and therapy dogs that aid people with disabilities and illness.

“Noble”

German Shepherd Dog

Charcoal Painting on drafting film

11″ x 14″

.

German Shepherd Dog original Charcoal Painting by Michelle Wrighton

“Noble” will be available for sale in late October/November as I have entered him in a couple of local art competitions.

All of the artwork in the CAG Helping Paws Exhibition is for sale with part proceeds going to rescue groups and shelters selected by the artists around the world.

To view the work of many talented canine artists, please visit the ‘Helping Paws’ Exhibition after October 1 (US time), and while you are there, vote for your favourite painting – the rescue group chosen by the artist who wins the People’s Choice award will receive a cash donation from the Canine Art Guild (as well as the artists’s donation pledge when the art sells).

If you have a German Shepherd Dog that you would like to see painted (obligation free) to help dog rescue please send me a photo or two and a brief description of your noble friend.

I will post the third and final entry to the Helping Paws exhibition on opening day, so look out for that one!

Thanks for looking:)

Michelle

“Royalty”

Greyhound Pet Portrait

Original acrylic painting

by

Michelle Wrighton

8″x10″ on 1.8cm deep gallery wrapped canvas

“Royalty” original Greyhound dog painting by Michelle Wrighton

This is a small acrylic pet portrait painting of Gilley, a rescue Greyhound dog from the UK. Greyhounds have the most beautiful, big, liquid, expressive eyes that are an absolute joy to paint. As a breed, Greyhounds have such a regal bearing that the deep purple background seemed appropriate for Gilley’s painting

These smaller paintings are very enjoyable to do, although this one is still quite detailed, I am really trying to loosen up and capture the essence of the animal without being totally pre-occupied with capturing every last detail!

The painting is continued on all four edges and is ready to hang. “Royalty” is available on merchandise and prints, but this is the first time this original painting from my personal collection has been offered for sale.

*The copyright watermark is a digital addition to the image below and is not on the original painting.