You are exposed when you give a gift to someone. You can’t tell right away if someone liked your gift. Waiting for the gift to be opened can be especially stressful when it is being given by the president of the United States. Mount Airy resident signed a visitor log at Room 45 in the Old Washington DC after receiving her gift in a modest plastic bag. A guard then delivered the bag that contained the portrait of Little Man, the president’s horse. More hints?

She paints portraits of animals. She turned her passion for animals and talent for portraiture, which she developed through art classes in high school, into a successful business after taking animal portrait lessons and art courses. Her business is doing well these days.

She uses pastels to draw from photos of animals taken by herself or the owner. She sometimes uses photos of horses from shows to create her portraits. She says that she gets close to the animals she paints, including horses, cats and dogs, as well as a goat, parakeets, and guinea-pigs. She loves painting fish, but would prefer oil paints to paint turtles. She can change the appearance of the animal, such as make it younger or remove any defects.

She says that she has been wanting to paint little man for a long time. The Special Assistant to President and Director for Correspondence replied with some color photos of the president on horseback. She found it difficult to work with pictures sent to her. It is not possible to paint a pet with just pictures, so she always visits the animal and its owner.

Little Man died later, while the project was still in progress. She wants to make sure that the portrait means something to President Trump. She started the work on the portrait and divided it into roughly four stages. She began by creating a pastel drawing that served as her base for the dark, medium, and light shades of shadow. She then added color accents along the contour lines, and blended the colors with her fingertips to cover the entire paper.

Little Man was given a background of light blue. The bland background came next. The artist said to make sure the portrait is realistic. The artist worked many hours to add the details necessary to make the portrait as realistic as possible.

She loved creating a portrait of Little Man. She keeps her only horse in Poolesville. At the same she has a cat and a dog. She is also very happy for giving the President her work.