Leisure Painter launched over 50 years ago in spring 1967. This article taken from that very first issue where David Shepherd, successful painter of wildlife, talks to Joanna Borchard about getting big game on to canvas.

Elephants and baobab trees are as familiar to artist David Shepherd as other people’s cats and apple trees.

As a painter of wildlife, his hobby, wild animals, is also his livelihood – and a very successful living it is too.

David Shepherd lives in an old farmhouse in Hascombe, near Godalming, Surrey, bought from ‘money provided by the elephants’, from the proceeds of his paintings. From there he goes off on trips to paint his jumbos, paintings of which have sold at £2,200 each, and which have in print form, been voted among the top prints of the year.

When he first attempted to be an art student, he failed the entrance examination of the Slade School. His earliest love was wild game, and he meant to be a game warden in East Africa. At Stowe school he read books galore about big game; at 19 he was off to Kenya to become a warden. Alas for his plans, requirements for game wardens included academic qualifications such as zoology, knowledge of the bush, and becoming a Kenyan. But the parks superintendents did take him on safari, and he saw the National Park and the Amboseli reserve for the first time.

Back in England nine months later, in 1951, he tried his second enthusiasm – painting. Refused by the Slade, he happened to meet marine artist Robin Goodwin, and was taken on as a pupil. ‘It was one of the best bits of luck I have had – he taught me how to be an artist and a business man. He told me if I wanted to be an artist I had to make my living as professionally as a stockbroker stockbrokes - I had to eat, read and sleep painting.’

Oddly enough it was through painting aeroplanes – his second love – that he first got the chance to paint big game. He used to spend a lot of time painting aircraft at London airport and eventually in 1955 gave a one-man show of aeronautical and industrial paintings at a London gallery. He sold 24 paintings and accepted 30 commissions. He was 24.

The R.A.F. began to take an interest; they asked him to paint pictures of military stations in Kenya for them – as a ‘peacetime war artist’ they flew him anywhere he wanted to go in Arabia and Kenya. ‘I did one picture of an Arab dhow and it led to 63 commissions. In Aden everything is paintable, people are culture hungry, and there is no one to paint for them.’ In Kenya, he did his first wildlife painting of a rhino. That began it.

His wildlife exhibition at the Tryon Gallery in 1962 sold 34 paintings out of 43 in the first half hour, and the four biggest were bought by fine art publishers. Proceeds from one picture went to the World Wild Life Fund, and another to the Water for Wild Animals Fund. In this way, he tries to give back to the wild animals what they have given him. In October 1965, east African Wild Life Society officials were jubilant when his lion painting was auctioned: ‘Bidding closed at pounds 2,200 stop very many thanks for your magnificent support – Wild Life Society’ went the telegram.

A charge sometimes levelled at him is that his work is so detailed as to be almost photographic. ‘In fact, I do work from photographs – but photographs I have taken myself. It is no use painting a tiger or an elephant just from a photo. You must have seen the animal in its natural environment, watched it move, and then taken the photograph.’ He does not take a sketchbook when on safari, but three cameras instead, one movie and two still. ‘I find it stupid to sit in the hot sun for three hours to sketch when, having seen the animal, I can take a photograph and work from that later. The photograph is to get the shape; I use my memory for the colour.’ Cameras have the advantage of being able ‘constantly to keep your eye on the animal – not like sketching where you are looking down at your work half the time’ he says.

He always works in oils on canvas, using a palette of 13 colours.

When on safari, he makes a bee line for the nearest game warden, and goes with him in his landrover. ‘They have the knack of finding animals immediately.’

His family of four daughters is too young to go on expeditions, but he has taken his wife Avril with him twice. The Tsavo park in Kenya is one of his favourite places for work. ‘It is not too green. I love the dryness of the place, it is the true Africa, burnt yellow grass and grey dried baobab trees.’

Now 35, he has plans for a New York show in October this year, a show in Johannesburg in 1969, a third London show in 1970 and one on the West Coast of Africa in 1972. He can hardly believe his own success – ‘It’s incredible.’

His tip: ‘You have to have enthusiasm to paint. Whether it is an engine or an elephant, you must see it as beautiful. For painting wild animals he says ‘if possible see them in their natural habitat, and not in a zoo. You can’t appreciate the difference until you have seen the animal in its natural setting. Zoo and wild animals are entirely different creatures.’

Visit the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation to website to find out what David has achieved in the 50 years since this article was published - davidshepherd.org