Mourning Cloak

Nature has certain rules for things that I don’t always pay attention to. I am working on a drawing of the mourning cloak butterfly for an activity book and wondering if I have put on too many spots—or not enough? On our escapades, my friend the master gardener has talked about petal groupings and configurations on different flowering plants, which somehow made me wonder if I’m putting too many spots on a butterfly… And yet, two of my coworkers and I did a mini field trip to a local taxidermy firm where the owner talked about retrofitting pre-built forms in proportion to the hides that go over them. He noted that animals, like people, vary in shape and size, even in the same species.

I know that in my art I often simplify or standardize a pattern or color on the animal, bird, or insect I am depicting, but somehow creating images which represent certain animals for kids to color leaves me asking that question—is there a certain number or pattern to the mourning cloak butterfly? And yet, here I am overthinking an image that kids will color any way they like, even out of the lines.