U.K's rarest native animal, Red Squirrel | Painting

Today in this blog, I'm writing about Red Squirrel, U.K's rare and native.


I was inspired to paint British wildlife animal when I was thinking of what to get for my brother's girlfriend, for Christmas gift. Though I asked my brother which wildlife animal does she likes, quite a few lists but this one animal that she likes the most as well as she finds them very cute, a red squirrel. Well, originally it was a grey squirrel but they're not native here, so I thought red squirrel it is. Because my artwork always focuses on British birds and wildlife, that's my speciality. Funny to think about it, I went to the Lake District in summer 2019 with 4 of my family, where red squirrels habitat. I was hoping to spot one there, even I stayed there for a week, sadly I haven't. It's why they're rare.

 I planned to work on A6 size, I thought it's a better size to display in the room, as well as more tidy, than having larger than A5 so that it doesn't take more space. Less is more!

 Took me a while to think about the background of materials and colours, then I have picked the metallic vinyl yet unsure of colours. These are the colours I have to choose from.

Satin gold, mirror sapphire, mirror copper, mirror silver and rainbow holographic.
I visualised it in my head which colours would be better, steered toward to copper a lot of the time yet worry that red squirrel's colour could blend into the copper. In the end, I took a risk going for copper.


Got the frame ready, I picked a grey wood textured frame I thought works well with copper, which gives some warm combining dark neutral tones as well as a modern touch. So I was ready to paint by using acrylics, working on the first layer of colour and body shape. Onto the next layer of more colours and textures, and so on.


Then did some finishing touch up and little details. With the photo shown below. 



Surprisingly can see the red squirrel from the copper background. Happy with this finished paint and framed it.


Looking ravishing with white faux fur backdrop.


 A close up of Red Squirrel.

 After having this wrapped up ready for Christmas and gifted to her through my brother in France. On New Year's Eve, she visited and said that she loves it and I have such a talent to paint this cute fluffy critter.

 Hope you had a wonderful Christmas and a good New Year celebration. 🎄 🎉


















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