 An introduction:Â
Six years ago I met the woman who would become my beautiful wife. I soon got to know her remarkable daughter Samantha and, most important of all, their chocolate standard poodle Hershey. He and I became fast friends in the years before he died at the grand old age of 14. Lulu, a fancy Canadian jet-black standard, came into our lives a few months later in the autumn of 2013. I’d never attempted to train a puppy before and Lulu proved both spirited and eccentric. Quickly, though, she acquired habits that made me realize that Hershey had never altogether left us. Just like him Lulu would bark up at the branches of trees as though this would conjure a squirrel into existence, she has become an enthusiast for Glenn Gould’s recordings of Bach, and – and this was what made me certain that Hershey was acting as her idiosyncratic spirit guide – she has developed an oil painting technique that is exceptional for such a young dog.
