Art-Time at the Zoo

Yes indeed!
My good, good friend and I went to the Woodland Park Zoo yesterday. I've been going to that zoo ever since I was about 4. The zoo is like a second home to me, it's one of the only public places where I can whole-heartedly myself and not worry about anything. It's almost like a stress reliever: meditation, even. When I bring my sketchbook, I can lose all of my thoughts just for a moment and become absorbed in the animals's beauty and complexity while I sketch or paint their likeness.
Another delightful part of the zoo is that every time I go, there seems to be something new on exhibit! This time around there was a exotic ground-bird exhibit (fowl, peafowl, pheasants, etc.) I had never seen this exhibit before, so I sat down and painted the most beautiful pheasant I have ever seen:

He (the golden pheasant) had free roam of the enclosure's path. And boy did he roam! I felt a little silly when I picked up my chair and had to scoot all around to get a good view of him so I could paint (at least a little) accurately. I'm still not satisfied with the gold color in my painting, but it does look better in real life, of course. My friend was drawing the other pheasant, who I thought ran just like a velociraptor from Jurassic Park.


We also went to see the Chilean flamingos!

Sleeping flamingos = easiest thing to draw ever.

Then, the birds and reptiles:




I'm pretty sure eyelash vipers are my favorite kind of snake. They have those adorable spiky eye crests and are the prettiest color yellow!

We also got to see a tiny little vine snake eat a live goldfish. He swallowed it whole and had a huge lump in his body-- SO cute. (Yes, cute!) I should have snapped a photo of it.

When we were at the wallaby exhibit, a little boy came running in, pressed his face to the glass, and shouted, "OH MOMMY, there are deer in here! Dead deer!"
To which his mother replied, "No, honey, they're not deer. Try again."
"...Buffalo?"
My friend and I busted out laughing. Children are hilarious, often without meaning to be. And that's saying a lot, since I'm really not fond of children in general.

But yeah, the zoo was amazing. I'm glad I was finally able to get paintings done of the animals, normally all I ever get are quick, sloppy pencil sketches.
I do declare another "zoo art" outing is in order for me.