WEST VIRGINIA (WOAY) – A local artist, teacher, and avid dog painter, Ashley Wheeler’s new pursuit is to paint West Virginia’s dog– Baby Dog.
She was chosen as this year’s State Fair of West Virginia’s official Art Print winner for her submission called “Lucky Duck.”
While she loves painting portraits of pets of all kinds, dog paintings are her specialty. Wheeler hopes to broaden her reach by being able to paint the state’s favorite dog.
“I love doing dog portraits, it’s my favorite thing to paint is people’s pets. And I said, well who could I do? I was scrolling on Facebook and I actually happened to see a post about Baby Dog and I was like oh my goodness, I think I know what I want to try to do, I want to try to paint Baby Dog,” she says.
Wheeler’s passion for painting pets started in middle school when she painted a portrait of her mother’s dog. She has now been expanding that collection ever since.
Her goal is for the idea to paint Baby Dog to make it to Governor Justice himself in hopes that he might respond. Along with that, she hopes it to be a project that could potentially reach people across the state to see and enjoy.
“I’m hoping that a lot of people will see the artwork that I’m capable of and I would love to start doing more commissions, that would definitely be my ideal goal for this,” says Wheeler.
People have been helping Wheeler gain some reach by re-posting the idea to their social media pages.
You can help support Wheeler’s efforts to paint Baby Dog by searching #LetMePaintBabyDog on Facebook and sharing her post.
