Tania Still is a unique phenomenon in British sporting art. Not since the days of Stubbs has an artist had the audacity to paint animals with such vigour, utterly divorced from their surroundings. Still paints foxhounds with such sensitivity that they are all we need to see. They float against the dun-coloured space of her canvases, their anatomy captured with expressionistic realism in deft, fluent strokes. It is, however, the scale of her work that is so breathtaking, presenting her hounds like full-length human portraiture. She raises the genre to a new level of engagement.
It is, though, in her evident depth of feeling for her subject matter that Still really excels. Take, for example, her six foot square painting of five hounds from the Fife hunt (no. 37). The hound on the left holds the key to the picture, his right foreleg stretched tense, guiding the eye directly to his own. It is clear to anyone who has ever known a hound what it is that has so transfixed her.
She and her companions are gazing at a human. This unseen presence, just to the viewer's left, might hold food, or a treat, or it might simply be their arrival that has the animals so wonderfully alert. Whatever the reason, here, as in all her work, Still captures the moment perfectly, demonstrating not only her consummate skill as an artist, but also a profound understanding of the timeless special relationship between animal and man.
Iain Gale, Author, Journalist and Art Critic, Scotland on Sunday
June 2007