Plastic Critters

A couple of Pinacosaurus grangeri cross a river in a gorge in Late Cretaceous Mongolia, aout 750 million years ago.

The style of this painting is hugely influenced by the work of Ely Kish, who died recently. She was one of the best painters to work on dinosaurs, and her 70s and 80s work was instrumental in teaching myself to paint.

Ely Kish wasn’t a specialised palaeoartist, and she got rather ahem strange direction from palaeontologist Dale Russell, which resulted in weird emaciated dinosaurs. On top of this, her later dinosaur work took on a cartoonish aspect which I don’t like, but I don’t think any of this should detract from the sheer painterly brilliance of her classic work.