The Waiting Game Drawing

And so my American wildlife series begins... I couldn't decide which beautiful animal to do first, so was delighted when Margot Raggett from Remembering Wildlife contacted me and the choice was more or less made for me. She asked me if I would be able to donate another image to their kickstarter campaign (following on from my donation of a wild dog print last year), that this year their book was to be about Remembering Bears and would I happen to have one floating around that I could donate, or could I get one done in a month! The answer was no I didn't, but that I would give it my best shot! The first thing was to find an image that I loved, one that was not typical, but was still powerful and told a story, which I think this image does in bucket loads! And then to work - I got rather carried away with the size and merrily drew the bear at least double the size than I originally intended, because I was under this misguided judgement that two very complex things to get right - wet fur and water - were easy. But after 6 weeks, almost a couple of hundred hours later and one near disaster the bear was finally done. I over ran by a couple of weeks, but thankfully it was no matter and the 5 donated prints have still been included in the campaign to raise some much needed funds. The original is available to purchase unframed (98w x 87hcm) for ease of shipping. I hope you enjoy this image as much as I have enjoyed drawing it and bringing him to life (as far as is possible of course!) I wanted to convey the sense of eager anticipation, the dogged determination, the cold, wet wait and so hope that you can connect with it too.