My Portrait – A Winner! – Judy Lavoie Art

As you can see, it’s not a self-portrait or even a human portrait. It’s my dog Maggie, who is now 11 years old. My reference was one of many photos I took of her the first day we adopted her as a 7-lb shelter puppy. Her innocence fooled us then - she turned out to be the most challenging pup we ever raised. Today she is calm and loving, but she occasionally shows her stubborn and independent streak! Her eyes are captivating and she has been the subject of several of my paintings in the last few years.

“Puppy Love” is one of the watercolor paintings I created last winter, aiming have three worth entering into the biennial Tennessee Watercolor Society exhibition. Every 2 years this show moves around the state; the region I belong to is Knoxville, the host venue for 2024. Not only is my colorful painting of Maggie one of the 50 out of 192 entries selected by juror Don Andrews, but he also chose it for the Region II Art Appreciation Award. It will be in the Traveling Show, which brings the juror's selection of 30 from the exhibition to four other locations* around Tennessee over the next few months, after ending its primary site at the Emporium in Knoxville on June 1st. The gallery hours are 9:00am-5:00pm Monday - Friday and Saturdays 10:00am-1:00pm.

My other two entries were “Tennessee Pastoral” and “Children Get Older.” I did lots of smaller watercolors to hone my painting skills in preparation for these, since I’ve been concentrating on scratchboarding as my media for the last couple of years. I tried a few techniques, aiming to loosen up my style - as you can see I was not too successful at this! Why fight it? I’ve come to the conclusion that I am able to incorporate some fluid areas in my watercolors (like the backgrounds), but I love love love the details.

Before doing “Puppy Love” I did a smaller watercolor family dog portrait called “My Boy,” a very different pose of my other dog Watson, now 10 years old and also a rescued pup. It helped me practice allowing the colors to blend randomly, painting with a limited palette of just primary colors, and preserving strong white highlights. I like to use bold, abstracted colors to create realistic images. Dog portraits are sort of my safe-space when it comes to painting subjects, so I am delighted that Puppy Love is in this highly regarded exhibition…. and so is Maggie!

I am grateful to be a member of the Tennessee Watercolor Society (TnWS). It is a very professional organization, run entirely by devoted, hard-working volunteers. With 200+ members from all around the state, the group represents the finest watercolor talent in Tennessee. This show made me look back at my track record, and I am proud to say I have been in every TnWS biennial exhibition since I joined in 2008, as well as in 3 online exhibitions I entered in alternate years. All who enter art competitions know that the juror cannot avoid being subjective - we all react with different emotions and opinions of the art we see. Paintings not chosen or even not entered for these shows are no less significant or valuable, especially considering the delight an artist has in creating them. Here is a collage of my TnWS exhibition paintings from more than two decades. Hopefully I’ll have more in the future!