This little gal was painted in a pair with Pure Malarkey. The custom order was for a dappled smutty buckskin tobiano and I wasn’t sure how well I’d pull it off so I painted one one smutty and one plain.

I personally liked Malarkey more, but in the end Angel went home with the customer and Malarkey cantered off to eBay.

Buckskins are a pain in the neck to paint since yellow plus black tends to end up green instead of brown. I got around this by using blending both colors into burnt umber instead of each other. I think I pulled it off okay, but it’s something that is much easier to accomplish using pastels.

The tobiano pattern is pretty unrealistic, but I had a habit of painting from imagination rather than reference photos. Something I’m keen on avoiding this time around… As nice as it is to just wing it, I really should be putting more work into the research end of the realistic horses.

Medium: Acrylics
Painted/Sold: Painted and Sold February 2004