I was looking through my pictures and I came upon this tree stump. I told you didn't I that my pictures usually start from SOMETHING, usually SOMETHING specific-ish. I knew I couldn't make a picture of a tree stump though so I thought and thought and thought and the idea of a squirrel popped into my head.
I'd like to say this guy came from a photo - hmmm, sadly not, I'm not quite that good at photography! - he came from an RSPCA book. There was an illustration that just suited my tree stump, so
I decided to felt it (because as far as copywriting is concerned, felting a piece changes it completely - you loosely base it on something but carding the wool often makes the colour of a picture more intense plus you needlefelt it according to artistic licence thus making it your own).
As for the vegetation, I looked at the photo again, there was some heather already there in
this case. For the foreground artistic licence once again took hold, my imagination ran wild, and I thought "conkers"!
And, I came up with the squirrel peeping over the tree stump. You see, sometimes a picture comes together just like that!
I decided to make the background dark because I wanted the squirrel and the stump to really dominate the picture, thus I filled as much as I could muster felting-wise with squirrel.
I couldn't help but think of Squirrel Nutkin you see, of Beatrix Potter fame, because eating a conker whilst everyone else is engaged was exactly what I had in mind...and it didn't
start out like that...that's the joy of felting a picture, you don't quite know what it's going to turn out like!
