prairie dock

Oil and mixed media on paper
26″ x 40″
ⒸCathy Haibach 2023

Prairie docks are one of my favorite Midwestern plants. The leaves are large and have a wonderful sandpaper-like texture. I can’t help but touch them whenever I walk by. The flower stalks are very tall; looking up, you see bursts of bright yellow against blue sky.

We have prairie docks in our front garden, and they always fill my heart – our little oasis of the deep-rooted natural history of this place, right in our urban North Lawndale parkway.

I started this piece by rolling intaglio ink on a prairie dock leaf and pressing it into the paper. The green on the leaves was applied with a small brayer rolled in oil paint. After painting the background and flower stalks, I pressed prairie dock flowers into yellow oil paint and then onto a separate piece of paper, which I later cut out and stitched onto the piece.

$650