I love drawing dogs. It comes from a childhood without a dog and with a great yearning for a dog. If I had been a wise child, I would have asked for a small dog, a dog so small you could fit it into the palm of your hand, but no, I wanted the magnificent Irish wolfhound, the dog I read about in Finn the Wolfhound, or a massive German Shepard Dog to aid me in my spy work as I pretended to be Mrs. Emma Peel.  No pleas to my father would work. He wisely said no. We lived in flats and who would walk the dog at night? I would! I would! But a ten-year old often promises the moon and delivers tears instead.  I have a dog now, Ted, a wire fox terrier. A  sensible size. We don’t roam the Highlands of Scotland or walk the misty fields of Ireland. We walk city streets and if he needs to go out at night, well, I do walk him!

Here are just a few drawings of dogs, all drawn in India Ink, with an old-fashioned pen and inkwell.

An early pen and ink study of a Border Terrier

I love Pen and ink, there is such a wide variety of style and effects to choose from. In this Border Terrier study, the lines are heavy and bold.

The Irish Terrier above is drawn with fine lines. A more delicate feel.

This study of the Sealyham Terrier was done in old-fashioned India Ink, a pen with a nib, one drop at a time.  I went blind a few hours each time I work on it. The world became nothing more than  dots. It took about seven nights to complete it. It was the last one I did in this style.

The Westie puppy. I was getting rather tired of  seeing dots, so I decided to combine them, a few dots here, and lines elsewhere.

This Bull Dog, Ch. Pugilist, just deserved the fine India Ink line. What a magnificent face he has!

Here’s a serious looking puppy A Sealyham Terrier Puppy in the Garden…