My sister is a horse lover and advocate who regularly donates to horse rescue societies so when it was her birthday recently, I did the same. I sent money on her behalf to a local non profit, the Bear Valley Horse Rescue. That seemed like a practical but impersonal gift for a much-loved person, so I decided to paint something, as well.
This image comes from scouring the web for “herd of horses”. It’s been substantially changed - as it should be since it’s not my image - and turned into something that I could see my funky sister enjoying. Her style is colourful and playful, so a conservative horse image would bore her as much as me. Hence the dots.
In life, the dots are as near to the same value as their settings as I could make them, they’re just much higher in chroma. The camera found this an impossible concept to capture and I gave up after a frustrating number of attempts. Take my word for it: the blue dots are the same value as the sky and the orange dots are the same value as the grasses. The result of this is a visual shimmer that can’t be achieved in any other way.
For me, the painting came to life with these dots. They elevated it from an earnest horse painting to something that would make my sister smile. Hopefully, they do the same for you.
Happy painting!