Grey Cube Gallery proudly presents the sixth Animals online art show for the month of February 2025. The show encompassed a range of artistic styles and mediums (oil on canvas, acrylic, pastel, graphite, scratchboard, colored pencil, watercolor, recycled metal, bronze, digital art, photography). Each submission has been judged based on the following elements of artistic expression: orginality and quality of art, overall design, creativity, interpretation of the theme, demonstration of artistic ability and usage of medium. Out of all entries, 64 artworks were shortlisted for inclusion in the show. The competition attracted entries from many countries across the world: Finland, Canada, USA, Austria, Taiwan, Australia, UK, China, Germany and Italy. Enjoy the show and thank you for expressing an interest in our competition.

I am a painter of birds – Australian birds mainly but not exclusively. My chosen media is oil paint, as I believe it gives greater depth and manipulation for the delicate detailing of each bird’s feathers. I also believe oil paint brings my subjects to life more so than other mediums. My goal with each artwork is to have the subject jump from the canvas into the viewer’s own reality. Attention to detail using fine bristled brushes allows me to highlight the intricate detailing of feathers, capture the unique character of each bird together with the contrast of light and shade. Every bird species is intelligent possessing its own personality. Some smile at you, others look coy or quizzical, demanding or subservient. The range of emotions they invoke never fails to amaze me. I have always loved birds and feel blessed to live in the South West of Australia, where we have a wonderful variety of bird life, that changes through the seasons. Many endangered species live only in our special part of the world. I do my little bit to help protect them, with a percentage of every original painting sold being donated to Birdlife Australia.

Shawna Hinkel is a Master Photographer and Certified Professional Photographer from Dallas, Texas. She has a Bachelor of Science in Journalism from Texas A&M University, and has been a professional photographer since 2004. She earned her PPA Certification in 2014 and PPA Master of Photography degree in 2019. She was awarded Life Membership in Dallas PPA in 2020, and earned her Accredited Professional of Animal Imagery degree in 2021. In 2023, she became the second Master of WPE from the United States, and also became a Master Photographer in Fine Art from MPI. Her work has been accepted in the PPA International Photographic Competition Annual Exhibition every year since 2016, with images published in the annual Showcase Collection and Loan Collection books as well. She was the Dallas Professional Photographers Association Photographer of the Year in 2017 and 2018, and was named as one of the Top 10 photographers in Texas in 2020. She also received the American Society of Photographers’ State Elite Award in 2020. She has won a variety of other awards, and has been featured in multiple art gallery exhibitions. She currently serves as 2025 President of Texas Professional Photographers Association and Co-Editor-in-Chief/Copy Editor of ASP Magazine. There are so many wonderful animals in the world. Some are jovial and funny; some are shy and reserved. It is amazing to watch them interact with each other and observe how much like humans they are. They show a variety of personalities and emotions. Spending the time to get to know them and see their individuality is very rewarding. I hope more people can find a deeper understanding and affection for them. If we spent more effort helping to save them and their environments, what a better world it would be.

Cher Pruys, ASAA SCA, IGOR, AAPL, CSAA, AMS, LMS, OSA, MAA, CFA, NOAPS, PSOA, AWA., AAOA. I am a self taught artists working in water based medium, mainly acrylic, but also at times gouache and water-colour. I am a hyperrealism painter fascinated by the world around me. I am very drawn to shiny surfaces as well as transparent objects, especially when the lighting brings them to life. I look for beauty in everyday objects that most people take for granted or just don’t truly see them as they are. The seemingly boring and mundane subjects can truly be like magnets if portrayed in the right light. Shiny metal is one of those materials that can host endless visions….the light hits it and the reflections are captured on the smooth, sleek surface…people and animals especially the eyes...an artists dream! My future art plans are to paint the countless subjects I have chosen to become paintings and to share my art with as many people as I can. "To take my inner visions with my hands and create a work of art for you the viewer .... That is the ultimate in self expression."

I am an animal artist whose medium is acrylic painting on canvas. I produce works in a realistic style, mainly equestrian, drawing inspiration from my photo references and the observation of live models The equine is the recurring theme in my artistic approach. Having been active in the equestrian world since 1993 (trainer, rider and stable owner), horses naturally became my main source of inspiration. The union of these two passions allows me to find the angle of pictorial expression that I am looking for. My work establishes a moment of complicity and respect between humans and animals. It highlights the horse in a proposition where the subject is in the foreground in an environment often deliberately omitted. The strength, complicity, collaboration, sensitivity and fragility of the animal take all the place. It is in this spirit that I approach this complex being, as well as its way of sacrificing its own essence to exist through the will of its owner. I express through my works the emotion felt when in contact with horses. The emotion that vibrates, that moves and moves the soul. I am inspired by the ethological movement which studies the behavior of horses. My production make feel the unique and singular essence of the personality of the equine subject that I highlight. These behavioral relationships are reflected in my works and express restricted freedom in a context of domestication of the equine being. We see a reflection of the constraints imposed by current society on animals, but also on humans. My artistic production is intended to express the complexity of the relationship between humans and animals in a bond where one sees its original freedom compromised for the desires and needs of the other.