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August Featured Artwork and Desktop Calendar: The Purrfect Camouflage

painting of cat behind flowers
The Purrfect Camouflage, 11 x 16, pastel © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

This was something I thought all cat companions could relate to, human and feline. Sophie really thought I couldn’t see her because she thought she blended right in with the flowers. She almost had me fooled until I saw one of the flowers looking back at me and I knew I had to investigate. Her ulterior motive was to eat the flowers, something I hate to clean up after. This picture was intended to be one of a pair, because in the next picture she was delicately biting a leaf.

Early on in my painting career I always worked from photos. After my success with “Waiting for Mom” from a photo I’d taken just because Fawn was cute I began taking photos more intentionally, planning paintings. Naturally, this was what made a photographer out of me, but it also made me aware of how early in the process the visualization actually began.

I know I took the photo in late summer, though it may have been later than now. But either a storm knocked down a bunch of my zinnias or I decided to cut them back when they developed mildew, as they often did in my damp little back yard. I’d get much more enjoyment out of them in a vase in the house, and who knew, I might actually decide to paint a still life.

I still remember deciding to photograph the flowers for just that reason, and looking at them, then surprised to see Sophie looking back at me when she sat up a little taller. Of course, the subject of the proposed painting changed from the flowers to Sophie.

Photo reference for The Perfect Camouflage
Photo reference for The Perfect Camouflage

I painted this loose little painting in 1994, just a few years after we’d moved into this house. I never did the second painting because I thought I should change more of the painting than just Sophie for it to be interesting independent of the first. But that’s okay because I really like this one, and it’s all I really needed to share about the moment.

The title was originally spelled “Perfect” because I named this one before I started adding any cat-related spelling variants into my everyday word usage. Even last year I wanted to retain that spelling because it was so long established, and was thought it might be confusing to change it mid-stream. When I used this painting as my featured artwork and desktop calendar in August 2020, I decided otherwise and simply began using the word “Purrfect” everywhere I could find it.

I sold the original at my exhibit, “Everything is Beautiful” at a local Borders Bookstore in June 2001, which had no theme but was kind of a kitchen sink exhibit, everything I had at the time. Sales were good, and it was fun.

I have always offered this image as a greeting card. I had actually wanted to catch up with the purchaser of the original so that I could give it a good scan instead of using a photo of the painting and a scan I felt was inferior. But I have better editing tools now than I did previously and it looks surprisingly good after a few updates to that scan of the photo, so now I can offer prints as well. Since the image is improved you’ll also find this image on many gift items.

. . . . . . .

Where to find this artwork

A New Member Thank You

Register for an account on Portraits of Animals and get a free matted print of “The Purrfect Camouflage” or choose from several other sketches, paintings or photos of cats and other subjects.

The New Member print is a signed digital print of my watercolor painting “The Purrfect Camouflage” made in archival inks on Epson Velvet Art Paper. This print is 8″ x 11″, matted in white an 11″ x 14″ frame.

This print is only available as a new member gift during this month while it’s the featured artwork and desktop calendar, so make sure you sign up before the end of the month!

Or purchase another size print or greeting card

I offer prints as:

  • digital prints on matte-finish art paper
  • giclees on art paper
  • on canvas in standard sizes
  • as framed prints, as shown, and custom framing is available

This painting is also available as a 5 x 7 greeting card with a white envelope individually and as the original set of Feline Fine Art Cards.

And also find this image on several gift items

You can find this art and more on Portraits of Animals. Search “purrfect camouflage” to find what’s currently available.


This month’s desktop calendar

I’ve worked this image into a desktop calendar for you to enjoy and use for the entire month. Looking at the downloads from previous months and averaging out which dimensions fit which devices, I have reduced the number of variations from 12 to three. It was very time-consuming to create all the variations with new devices arriving all the time, so I have one for horizontal monitors/screens, one for square monitors/screens, and one that should fit the dimensions of nearly all mobile devices.

If these sizes don’t work for your device, or if you have problems, please let me know. Often I can troubleshoot the reason an image won’t download or won’t load on your device, but if I just can’t figure it out I can just email it to you and hope that works.

 

How to download and use your desktop calendar

  1. Click on one of the images below that matches the dimensions of your monitor to open the image in a new page.
  2. For desktop computers and laptops, right-click on that image and on a desktop computer choose “save as desktop wallpaper” or “save as background” or whichever option your operating system gives you to be able to do this. You may also simply save it to your hard drive and set it as your background from there.
  3. For mobile devices, download the image to your gallery then choose it as your wallpaper—this is slightly different on all devices.

Horizontal and HD monitors and screens

Desktop calendar 2560 x 1440 for HD and wide screens.

. . .

Square monitors and screens

Desktop calendar 1280 x 1024 for square screens.
Desktop calendar 1280 x 1024 for square screens.

. . .

Small Mobile Devices and Tablets

Desktop calendar, 600 x 800 for iPad, Kindle and other readers.
Desktop calendar, 600 x 800 for iPad, Kindle and other readers.

. . .

Cell Phones and Smartphones

Desktop calendar, for 400 x 712 for mobile phones
Desktop calendar, for 400 x 712 for mobile phones

Take a look at other featured artwork and desktop calendar posts.

Each month I feature a piece of feline artwork from the archives to the present day, discuss its history and process, and set it up as a free downloadable desktop calendar for just about every electronic device available.


Click here to see daily sketches, click here to see daily photographs

click here to see other artwork featured on The Creative Cat

or visit Feline Artwork on my main website.

If you are interested in a print of this image, check Portraits of Animals to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit Ordering Custom Artwork for more information on a custom greeting card, print or other item.


Gifts featuring cats you know! Visit Portraits of Animals

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Fine ArtPhotographyGiftsGreeting CardsBooksCommissioned Portraits & Artwork



Copyright

All images and text used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission, although links to your site are more than welcome and are shared. Please ask if you are interested in using and image or story in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of an image or a product including it, check my animal and nature website Portraits of Animals to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit Ordering Custom Artwork for more information on a custom greeting card, print or other item.


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© 2022 | www.TheCreativeCat.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Weekly schedule of features:

Sunday: Essays, Pet Loss, Poetry, The Artist’s Life

Monday: Adoptable Cats, TNR & Shelters

Tuesday: Rescue Stories

Wednesday: Commissioned Portrait or Featured Artwork

Thursday: New Merchandise

Friday: Book Review, Health and Welfare, Advocacy

Saturday: Your Backyard Wildlife Habitat, Living Green With Pets, Creating With Cats

And sometimes, I just throw my hands in the air and have fun!

 
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Bernadette

From health and welfare to rescue and adoption stories, advocacy and art, factual articles and fictional stories, "The Creative Cat" offers both visual and verbal education and entertainment about cats for people who love cats, pets and animals of all species.

3 thoughts on “August Featured Artwork and Desktop Calendar: The Purrfect Camouflage

  • Pingback: August Featured Artwork and Desktop Calendar: The Purrfect Camouflage ~ The Creative Cat - Portraits of Animals

  • I’ve been working on that and other issues all this month, however I haven’t actually posted since that post!. When PHP updates, sometimes it throws off the feeds because I have an issue with one of the databases that make up my site. Way back when I moved from free WordPress to self-hosted, my databases didn’t move well. It’s impossible for me to find where the error is, so I go around and “jiggle” things and my host tries loading different versions of PHP. I just updated WordPress and did some other work day before yesterday and I see we’ve got it this time. Thanks for checking in now that you’re getting it back!

    Reply
  • Well, it’s August 20, and this is the first time that your blog has shown up on my blog list, which updates when there are new posts. Something weird is happening, so I’ve put my email in, to see if I get notice of your new posts.

    Reply

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