This wonderful and happy woman had seen some of my other portraits of dogs and determined that I should come meet her dear dog Rexi who was old and had cancer. When I arrived at her door she greeted me exclaiming that she had just been looking up in the cloud shapes and all of a sudden she ‘saw Rexi skipping up to Heaven’!

I knew in that moment that it had to be the pose, at least for part of the painting. We proceeded to look through 15 years of photos of life with Rexi, including hiking up to the fantastic ‘Shangri-La’ Lake at the base of ‘Elephant’s Perch’ mountain in the Sawtooth Mountains.

Rexi’s painting is done with soft pastels on sanded paper in the in-set center and the large mat, with my carved and painted frame, 33 x 43 inches.

Rexi’s ‘Mom’ was so happy with this painting that she said to me – Oh, now you have to do one of my younger dog too, Molly,  and “she has two kitties!”

 But, before moving on to see Molly’s painting, have a look below at the enlarged detail photos of Rexi and especially the carved frame of which I am very proud.” - G.P.L.