Dog Tired

Dog Tired © 1993 Ann James Massey
8in x 12in | 20.3cm x 30.5cm
Oil on mahogany board
Collection of James D. Schwartz, A Man of D-g
Dog Tired © 1993 Ann James Massey

8in x 12in | 20.3cm x 30.5cm
Oil on mahogany board
Collection of James D. Schwartz, A Man of D-g

For the story behind the painting, scroll down or click here

Available for Purchase

  • Dog Tired Note Card

    $4.00

    Folded note card. Blank inside, ready for any occasion. Measures 7in x 5in closed and includes an envelope.

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Awards

Second Place Oil or Arylic Painting
1993 Art Show at the Dog Show, Wichita, Kansas USA
Finalist
Cats and Dogs, online: sponsored by Red Bluff Art Gallery

Reproduced in Magazine

Dog Fancy Magazine (March 1994)

Behind the painting

Though I paint for myself in choosing my subject matter, my work belongs to someone else. Thank Providence or I could not continue to paint and draw. Each piece I create has a story or personal meaning for me, but almost as often, it has different story or personal connection to another. Dog Tired is one such piece.

This is a painting of my young sheltie, Mindy, and my ex-husband Wayne in our bed. I have been a voracious reader ever since I could pick up a book and these books were specifically chosen for the painting. Starting top left: Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte which I had read passionately three times before I was twenty; Zotz! by Walter Karig, two different people had given me this fantasy science fiction book as it was my first married name; The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone’s novel based upon the life of Michelangelo; the open book is Lust for Life also a novel by Stone concerning the life of Vincent van Gogh; At Dawn We Slept by Gordon W. Prange for the obvious pun; and E E Cummings Complete Poems 1913-1962 one of my favorite poets.

One of my friends and former art student fell in love with the piece and was making payments for the purchase of it. In the meantime, I entered it into The 1993 Art Show at the Dog Show in Wichita, Kansas where it won Second Place for an Oil Painting and was reproduced in the March 1994 issue of Dog Fancy Magazine (“Art Show at the Dog Show”). Shortly afterwards, I received a phone call in Paris from James Schwartz in Colorado who saw the image in the magazine and told me that it was him in the bed with his dog, and that E E Cummings was his favorite poet and he loved the movie Zotz! as a kid. He absolutely had to have that painting! I explained to him that unfortunately the piece was already sold. By the end of the phone call, I was so moved by his enthusiasm for the painting that I did give him permission to do a blow-up from a slide of the piece I sent him. A few months later, my friend called me distraught because she could no longer keep up the payments as she was getting a divorce. I told her not to worry, I had a buyer.

James Schwartz & Simcha
Photo courtesy of James Schwartz
James Schwartz & Simcha
Photo courtesy of James Schwartz

Dog Tired was personal to me, but the painting belonged to Jim, A Man of Dog in his own words.