From the Archives: A Photo and a Sketch, Stanley With Geraniums, 2006 and 2013

Two weekends ago when I featured Three at the Door featuring Namir, Kelly and Sophie I saw a set of photos in the folder from that same day, July 30, 2006, that I knew I would share those photos too, because of Stanley with geraniums and a sketch by that name I’d done from one of them.

In summer 2006 Stanley was 24 years old.* He’d been one of my garden cats for at least five years, overlapping with Moses’ tenure beginning about a decade before. We’d just lost Moses in February 2006 and I made sure Stanley got all the attention I could give him, along with subcutaneous fluids and select foods and other goodies to help his body deal with his age, though you’d never know he was 24 years old. Mostly he napped. Here is a closeup of his face.

It was clear I was out on the deck. And what was I doing? Well, I’d started out reading and drinking my coffee, but Stanley was so cute snoozing on the picnic table that I got busy taking pictures. Imagine that! Me, taking pictures of one of my cats! And thinking of a painting or a sketch…

And those three were at the door, 1) not happy I was outside instead of inside paying attention to them, 2) that I was paying attention to Stanley, which I did all the time (well, he was 24 years old you guys!), and 3) I was showing no signs of coming back in. In fact, I kept taking pictures.

In addition to the first photo in this post, which was the one I eventually chose as my reference, these two were also possibilities (I put a broken border on one of them just to be different).

But looking over the images I had also taken this closeup of him, which I also considered, but I wanted to catch the whole scene knowing I could crop out parts of it later that I wanted to use in other ways.

About the sketch “Stanley With Geraniums”

“Stanley With Geraniums” was not a daily sketch but was a new piece of artwork I’d created in 2013 in time to use it as my July featured artwork and desktop calendar, so it’s totally a July/summer memory. Here’s what I had to say in 2013 when I introduced the sketch.

This image is one I’ve wanted to do for years—since the very moment it depicts, in fact, on July 30, 2006, when Stanley and I enjoyed a Sunday morning on the deck.

As I’ve been digging through old photos while I’ve been moving them to my studio and organizing, both prints and digitals, I’m finding special moments I’d forgotten, moments of inspiration, beauty and especially a growing closeness with my older generation of cats even as they stepped ever closer to their last days with us. While it seemed like any other morning, looking at the rest of the photos from this day, I can see this was a quietly memorable morning. This was Stanley’s last summer with us, he’d been with me for 21 years and at my best guess was 24 years old*, and he and I spent every possible moment together, especially out on the deck, especially after losing his favorite girl, Moses, the previous February. While he slept most of the time and was fragile and often confused, each time our eyes met we built a deepening bond I’ll always carry with me; we had lost Moses and Cream in the spring, Lucy had just joined us in June, and though there were seven (or more) other cats in the house, Stanley and I carved out time for just the two of us nearly every day.

And on this morning when I looked at Stanley sleeping on the table I knew I’d want to remember this moment and to paint or sketch it, and visualized it in this style. (A work is called a painting if the medium covers the surface edge to edge, but a sketch if it leaves some of the background unworked, which is why this is called a sketch rather than a painting.) But believe it or not, for as often as you see this particular style of ink sketch with watercolor washes, I was not at all skilled with it at that time and had only tentatively experimented in a few sketches. The desire to see this sketch on paper was one of the driving forces for me to work this out through my daily sketches, find the right drawing pen with the right ink, the right brushes and set of watercolors. And finally, seven years later (I was writing this in 2013), here it is.

The details are comforting to look at: the round picnic table where I’ve spent so much time with and without cats; the faded linen dishtowel calendar with the cardinals, one of many with birds, all of which are beyond threadbare and completely faded now; the mug I loved for my Sunday morning coffee; the binoculars my mother had used to watch birds and I “inherited” for birdwatching, given to her by my erstwhile brother-in-law who’d served in Viet Nam; the geraniums, collected over years from friends and family, overwintered and renewed each year—they are ancestors of the ones you see in my photos and paintings today.

You can see I took a number of liberties with lightening up the entire scene and reorganizing some of the flowers, but this particular digital camera was not terribly accurate for color or lighting, and being able to change some of the details is part of the fun and challenge of creating an original piece of artwork. I actually liked the flag in this photo and had originally intended to include it because I’d brought it home from the Carnegie Memorial Day parade I’d taken my mother to in May and that was a memory too, but I didn’t want to “date” this painting for a holiday or event, or set it for a country since many of my readers and collectors are from other countries. That detail was not so important to me as the others I included.

I treasure all the years I had with Stanley, will always remember those times with Stanley and Moses outside, and that last summer into autumn when I could see that he was losing mobility and awareness month by month. I have many photos and several paintings or sketches with him as the subject. He will be a part of me forever.

*About Stanley’s age: briefly, he showed up on my porch in November 1986 and the veterinarian who examined him guessed his age as “between three and five.” I suggested we take the average and guess his age was four years old, so that was added to his paperwork.

Where to find “Stanley With Geraniums”

I still have the framed original plus prints on paper and canvas, a greeting card and notecard, and lots of gift items.

Read the details on Portraits of Animals.

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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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