We interview S.O.F.A. member France Bauduin about her art.
What first drew you to painting cats?
My queen Spooky had her first litter of kittens in our house and I decided to do graphite pencil drawings of the two kittens (Lucky & Grippette) she had as they were growing up. I stopped once they were 9 weeks old and moved to colour pencils. I then tried to do a colour pencil of each kitten (about 75) that was born in our house from our two queens, first Spooky and then her grand-daughter Laila.
What’s your favourite cat painting ?
From that period, it’s a drawing of my cat Griffin. II named it “Afternoon Watch”. He was lying on his outdoors wood table with the sun backlighting it. One of the photos I took turned great and for once I managed to draw the perfect background. I wanted to keep it for myself so when I put it in an exhibition, I doubled its price. It sold. In the end, I only had it on my wall for 3 weeks.
What’s a recent artistic accomplishment you’re most proud of?
My most recent artistic accomplishment is probably that drawing of a lone tiger with a particularly good light on its fur from a photo from my friend Anne Noël. I agonised for ages about the kind of background to put behind it and just could imagine something that would particularly enhance it. In the end I settled by giving it a solid foreground to stand on, finishing with an edge and let the viewer imagine what kind of environment it could be looking at: a disappearing habitat? a burned forest? A cliff? A friend helped me come up with the perfect title “Edge of Extinction”.
Society Of Feline Artists 