Apparently so…
On Sundays I like to try something that’s a break from the usual bird business, and I recently saw a post on LinkedIn (of all places) about tapirs. I have always liked tapirs, even though I’m not quite sure what they are, evolutionarily speaking; I think they share an ancestor with elephants and rhinos. This will age me, but like most children of the seventies, I had a set of Britains animals – both farm and safari – and I was always fascinated by the black and white tapir. I wondered why the post on LI had a dark brown one with big ears, and I then realised that there are in fact four species of tapir, all endangered, naturally, but I decided to celebrate this nugget of information by painting them in my sketchbook.
I’m enjoying my looser pencil-gouache combo illustrations and I’m trying to discipline myself to use new paint for the birdwatching logbook artwork which undoubtedly works more pleasingly, and then challenge myself to use up the dried and muddied remnants for my own work. Not as depressing as it sounds, as those mixed colours often give some lovely combinations and surprise results, but they are less helpful when I’m trying to be accurate with plumage, and have to mix enough of a colour to go back and touch up if necessary.
It didn’t quite work with the tapirs as I had very little brown and a lot of orange and purple, so I allowed myself a squeeze of burnt umber as the Baird’s, Woolly, and Brazilian tapirs are all brownish-black with greyish bits.
As you can see I totally misjudged the placement and composition but that’s what a sketchbook is for, and besides, their feet are all the same really.
Aren’t they adorable?
Yes, adorable indeed. I didn’t know there were several types of Tapir. As they say, you learn something new every day. I love the way you are always finding new things to introduce to your sketch book – and to your followers! Thank you.
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Thanks Ma!
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