Cat and white dog: a Peaky Blinders-style panorama

The ‘Cat and White Dog: Peaky Blinders’ panorama painting brings together two unlikely allies in a single sweeping image. Both are wearing woven baker’s caps, pulled low over their heads. The dark-grey cat on the left almost blends into the black background, whilst the white bulldog on the right stands fully in the light, revealing every crease of his muzzle.

What strikes you is how differently the light treats the two animals. Of the cat, only two yellow eyes, a silvery bridge of the nose and a fan of white whiskers remain; the rest is darkness. The dog is laid bare: the wrinkled pink nose, the heavy jaws, the soft skin around his eyes. Yet they both look straight into the camera in exactly the same way, calmly and unhurriedly, and that makes them, despite all their differences, a credible pair.

Little colour, lots of deep black and a single, carefully directed light source: this gives the print a restrained elegance that would look perfect above a sofa, in a stairwell or on the wall of a study. Anyone who appreciates animals with character will immediately recognise two faces here that radiate something special. Anyone who follows British crime series will spot the caps and know exactly what’s going on. And even those who aren’t interested in any of that will pause for a moment, because those two look very convincingly as though they’re discussing something together.