Author: isadora

Five Great Christmas Gift Ideas for Pet Lovers

Posted on by isadora

August is around the time I start getting inquiries for Christmas orders. It may seem a bit early, but here's a secret… I LOVE the early holiday shoppers! It gives me that extra bit of breathing room to work on their portraits before the big holiday rush.

Here are a few great ideas for holiday gifts for the pet lover in your life!

Dog portrait Christmas Gift

Colorful Pet Portrait

Giving somebody a portrait of their favorite pet is an amazing holiday gift. It shows forethought, planning, and it is completely unique. Plus, it's handmade, so there is ZERO possibility that somebody will give them the same gift. Plus, it lasts a lifetime. Every time they see that portrait on the wall, they'll remember how thoughtful you were to give them a gift that touched their heart, because there is nothing a pet lover appreciates more than something related to their beloved dog, cat, horse, iguana, parakeet… you get the picture!

Click here to order a pet portrait.

Dog portrait Christmas Gift

"Pocket Sized" Colorful Pet Portrait

Slide one of these mini portraits into somebody special's stocking or tuck one into a little gift bag for a BIG surprise! These small, custom pet portraits are absolutely adorable and are perfect as gifts or as "pocket portraits" to fit easily in your favorite pet lover's cubicle at work, bedside table, or even into a suitcase to take that pet's image along during travel! These little beauties have all of the same quality as a larger portrait… they're just smaller! What a fun, unique and thoughtful gift.

Click here to order a mini pet portrait.

Dog portrait Christmas Gift

Surreal Style Pet Portrait

If your favorite pet lover leans towards the more unusual things in life, this is a gift like no other! These custom portraits are a fusion of my contemporary painting style with the amazingly beautiful Mexican Day of the Dead style for a truly unique piece of art featuring your beloved animal. It is a dreamy and surreal take on portraiture that is sure to please the dog or cat lover on your Christmas list!

Click here to order a surreal and dreamy pet portrait.

Dog portrait Christmas Gift

Tattoo Style Pet Portrait

Does the pet lover on your list like a little rock-n-roll mixed in with their art? Then this tattoo-style pet portrait is just the ticket to ace your Christmas giving this holiday season. These 8" x 10" portraits are painted in fluid acrylics on hand-made rice paper with a gorgeous emulsion of sea shell powder that gives it a lustrous surface. They are custom portraits created from your photos in a really special and unusual style, with the pet's name hand-painted right in the banner. Nobody will be expecting this amazing gift!

Click here to order a tattoo style pet portrait.

Perfect Christmas Gift for Pet Lovers

Pick Any of my Other Hand-Painted Gifts for the Win!

Maybe a portrait just isn't what you want to give. No problem! I have a wide selection of hand-painted gifts in my store that are ready to please the most discriminating pet lover on your shopping list. From hand-painted tote bags and pillows, to prints, jewelry boxes, and even some original paintings already painted and ready to hang on the wall, I've got you covered. Stop by my store and browse around!

Click here to browse through my online store.

Custom Pet Portraits Make Great Gifts!

Posted on by isadora

Best Gifts for Pet Lovers

When it comes to people who adore their pets, you know what kind of gifts they treasure most. Gifts that relate to their pets! Even better are personalized pet gifts. The challenge can be finding items they don't already have, and ones that will last a long time.

The best gift for the dog, cat or horse lover in your life (or bird, reptile, you name it!) may be a portrait of their pet. Looking at the responses I've received from some of my clients who have commissioned a portrait of a friend or loved one's pet, it's a surefire win in the gifting department!

Click here to order a portrait!

"When I saw the painting for the first time I was amazed and knew my wife would love it… [it] even brought her to tears. This one painting symbolizes so much for me, my wife and our puppy Rey…"

"Beautiful. I couldn't think of a better way to honor the memory of my dog… I love it!"

"Such wonderful paintings! I can't wait to order more!"

"Perfect gift for a family that recently lost their pet."

If you'd like to order a portrait, the process is easy and fun! Click here to view available sizes and pricing details. You can also give a gift certificate for a portrait to allow your friend or loved one to be a part of the process as I create the painting.

Bottom line: the perfect gift that will last a lifetime is a click away. How easy was that?

It’s getting hot, hot, hot!

Posted on by isadora

Social media expansion for my art is in full effect!

Summertime here in southern Arizona is no joke! As the temperatures soar well above 100 degrees, I'm finding myself enjoying time at the easel that much more (if that's even possible!).

 

I'm also doing some of those little things I always mean to do, but just never seem to get around to doing, like working on establishing myself more on social media, and creating some fun ways for people to feel more in touch with my art and process.

 

That said, I've created an Instagram account for my art at instagram.com/artbyisadora where you can see more of my work, plus fun features like time-lapse videos of my art being created.

 

You can also always follow my other social media pages, such as my Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest pages.

 

Thanks for keeping in touch, and if you are also in the heat this summer, stay cool!

How to have a custom portrait painted of your pet

Posted on by isadora

Ordering a custom painting of your pet in three easy steps!

Having a portrait painted of your pet is a fun and easy process! Just follow these three easy steps:

  1. Choose the style of portrait you'd like. Options range from colorful and contemporary, to stylized and dreamy.
  2. Take some great reference photos of your pet. A few tips are to get out into natural light, or take the photo by a window, and get down to "pet level" for the photo (often this means sitting or kneeling down on the ground to take the photo). Send quite a few photos to give me lots of images in my "tool box" from which to work!
  3. Let me know all about your pet. I want to know the quirks that make your pet unique, and stories that illustrate your pet's personality are fantastic! Again, this gives me a nice, full tool box while I'm working on your portrait! My goal is to make the painting or drawing "breathe" with the life of your pet, and every detail you provide adds to my ability to do so.

That's it! The rest of the process is up to me. I'll send you sketches, color swatches, and will keep you in the loop along the way.

Please let me know if you have any questions at all. I look forward to working with you to create a piece of art your family will cherish!

Colorful Pet Portraits | Modern Dog Art

Posted on by isadora

Bold and colorful pet art… I love it!

It is just super-fun to paint portraits of people's pets using a lot of color, movement and fun styling in the painting. While I also will happily paint in a subtler palette if that's what appeals to a client (after all, their happiness is absolutely my top priority), I do have a lot of clients come to me asking for colorful, whimsical, surreal and dreamy portraits of their pets. It's a little something I offer that is different from other portrait artists, and that is special.

When it comes to my Day of the Dead styled paintings, color is just naturally a part of that art's style. But in my contemporary pieces, it can always come into play as well. Color-lovers, enjoy!

Rockabilly and Tattoo-Inspired Gift Ideas

Posted on by isadora

Searching for "tattoo gifts" can lead to some pretty terrible, cliche suggestions. Below are a few that are actually cool. Enjoy!

Personalized Traditional Tattoo Print

This print is beautiful, and can be personalized with any names or phrase you would like.

It makes a great wedding or anniversary gift with the sweeties' names in the banner, or you can have any phrase you'd like placed in the scroll, such as "True Love" or "Never Forget".

It's printed on a really heavy, textured, beautiful paper with gorgeous inks, and it's under $20, no matter which size you choose (8x10 inches or 11x14 inches, which will both slip right into a standard frame).

Click here to get it!

Pin-Up Jewelry Box

Have you bought some jewelry for your honey, and you need the perfect box to put it in? You're covered…

All three of these boxes are pretty fantastic.

Vintage-style pin-up girl: This sailor-style beauty is traditional and gorgeous. Click here to get it.

Swallow on red box: This one comes personalized on the front with your sweetie's name. Click here to get it.

Custom pin-up box: Have a box created with your sweetie as a pin-up, along with her name! Totally unique. Click here to get it.

Personalized Throw Pillow

Here's a gift that can be snuggled up to every night… and it is personalized!

Click here to get it!

There are some other designs in the store, including an anchor and scroll, or a heart and arrow with a scroll. They're all great.

Koi Fish Traditional Tattoo Print

This is another gorgeous print.

Traditional Japanese tattoo-style art with swirls of water and koi in a yin-yang design. It's printed on beautiful, heavyweight paper and cmes in perfect sizes to drop into a frame. An easy gift that'll look great on the wall.

Click here to get it!

Create her name in hand-painted letters!

If your sweetie likes cherry blossoms, here's a great idea. Order the letters of her name painted with traditional wind bars and cherry blossoms.

Or, order a word, such as "love" in the letters.

No matter how you do it, this is a gift that will last for years and will be enjoyed every day.

Click here to get it.

Tattoo Art Gift Tags

Top of your gift with one of these gift tags. The scrolls on the fronts of the tags are blank so that you can write the name of your gift recipient in them. What a unique idea for gift tags! The name becomes a part of the art (and the art, by the way, is really beautiful)!

Also great is the fact that these tags aren't made from paper, like most gift tags. They're made from a heavy-weight card stock, so again, not a throw-away item.

Click here to get them!

The Best Mother’s Day Gift Ideas – buy hand-made

Posted on by isadora

Hand-made gifts last a lifetime

Recently, when we gave one of my hand-painted, personalized jewelry boxes to a relative at Christmas, I was humbled by the response. My husband's cousin was absolutely thrilled and immediately got in touch to say how much the gift meant to him and his daughter. "This will last a lifetime" is the response we received. How amazing to think of a gift lasting a lifetime, when so much that people buy these days are throw-away items.

Mind you, this is a jewelry box that I sell for only about $30 in my shop. But what floored him was not the price, and that's the beauty of hand-made and personalized gifts. It was the fact that this gift is one-of-a-kind. We didn't run to the store at the last minute and buy something in a hurry. This is a gift that was thought out and created with care, just for his daughter.

The point of all of this is that we have a choice when we give to those we love. I encourage everybody to give thoughtfully, and if possible, to give hand-made from a small shop or individual artist. If it's something from my shop, thank you! I think my hand-painted gifts and pet portraits are fantastic gifts that will last forever. But even if it's not from my shop, I encouraging supporting any working artist while giving unique and beautiful gifts that come from the heart.

Happy Mother's Day to all of those amazing moms out there!

Save on Art to Save Hemi

Posted on by isadora

Sad news from the vet today, as a biopsy of a growth on my dog's paw came back abnormal. The tumor has to be removed, and with its location and continued growth, the sooner we do that the better.

I've added a coupon code to my shop for 15% off of any purchases over $50, for sales to put towards his surgery and recovery. If you've been considering commissioning a portrait of your own pet, or are just on the lookout for some amazing art and hand-painted gifts, use the coupon code HELPHEMI at checkout to support my sweet pup. I'll keep the coupon valid until there have been enough sales to cover his vet fees. Please feel free to share the code with friends.

Hug your pets tightly! They are precious, and who knows how long we will be blessed with their presence.

Beautiful Pet Memorials – Portraits to Remember

Posted on by isadora

I'm often asked to paint portraits of pets who have passed over the rainbow bridge. It's a bittersweet process for both me and my clients. It's an honor when they choose me as the artist to capture their dog, cat or other beloved, lost pet, and I feel privileged to be a part of their healing as they share special memories and stories with me during the creative process. Often, it's a friend of the person who has lost a pet who comes to me to commission a portrait as a gift for their friend. I can't think of a more thoughtful gift.

Sometimes clients choose to have a contemporary portrait painted, but many also choose to have a Day of the Dead style of portrait created as a memorial of their pet. I live in southern Arizona where we have a huge Día de los Muertos celebration every year. Being a part of this culture has inspired me to offer the sugar skull pet memorials, and I have been surprised, actually, by how many people know and understand their significance and have been thrilled to have found somebody who will paint a sugar skull of their pet.

No matter what style of portrait people choose, I'm honored to have the opportunity to help them through the grieving process, and to present them with something beautiful to have in their home to always remember their dear, special lost pet. If you are interested in learning more about the portraits I offer, please click here to go to my website.

 

Only the Coolest Valentine’s Gifts

Posted on by isadora

Valentine's Day approaches, and I'm sure there are a lot of guys out there wondering exactly what to give their girlfriends or wives.

Rest easy, fellas. I've got you covered.

My hand-painted jewelry boxes have a very cool, edgy feel to them and most of them have a rockabilly / tattoo styling to the art. They are the perfect box in which to give jewelry or other small gifts, and they are entirely unique. Even better, they all are personalized with her name (in the photos, note the banners on the fronts and lids of the boxes), and one of the box options has your own honey painted as a pin-up on the lid. Super-cool.

Check out the boxes, plus all of my other hand-painted tattoo-style gifts and goodies at www.artbyisadora.etsy.com