Chris Chantland - Artist of Champions
By Jane Singelton

Chris’ passion for art was evident at an early age. He has memories of his first grade teacher catching him sketching Batman and Robin while he was supposed to be listening to her. “My Mom said the drawing had to stop,” Chris said. “But my Dad told her, ‘No, no. Let him draw. It may grow into something.’ So I kept on drawing from the age of six.”

“I never had any formal art training,” said Chris. “The way I learned how to paint is I would draw people I idolized. I would draw endlessly people I admired. In junior high I would listen to John Denver, who was my idol at the time and I would draw him over and over.”

“One time when I lived in Tucson I went to the University of Arizona to talk to some professors. I asked them about classes and showed them my work. They told me that the best training I could get was to continue being around other artists. That’s how I honed my talent,” explained Chris.

Surprisingly, Chris’ life as a professional artist didn’t really take off until later. After taking courses in history at the University of Wyoming and completing a 10-week experience at John Denver’s Windstar Foundation near Snowmass, Colorado, Chris landed a job at Tri-Tronics, a company that manufactures dog training equipment. This new job introduced him to the dog-world of Pointers and Retrievers. Once Chris got an inside view of that world, he was addicted.

After working his way up to marketing manager, Chris became involved with people who were handling and training dogs. Tri-Tronics was put on the map, in part, by people who own field trial and hunt test retrievers, according to Chris. “Some of our biggest customers were field trialers, so I got to know a lot of people in the Lab world, most of them in Thomasville, Georgia.”

Thomasville is often regarded as “dog-central” to the dog world, because some of the most accomplished Field Trial Retriever trainers and hunt testers often go there to train or compete, especially in winter. Thomasville is surrounded by plantations established after the turn of the century primarily for hunting wild quail.

During his years as marketing manager for Tri-Tronics, Chris traveled to Thomasville to take photos for advertising campaigns and to get inspiration for marketing programs by talking with customers. In the process, Chris developed lasting friendships and a passion for the land, its history, and its sport. “It’s definitely a love of mine,” says Chris. “Those people I love dearly.”

In a bold and benevolent move in 2001, Chris offered to donate paintings of each year’s National Retriever Club Champions to the owners of the dogs. Dennis Bath of the National Retriever Club and the National Amateur Retriever Club said, “Great! We’ll present the paintings at ceremonies the following year when the trophies are awarded.”

Every year since then Chris has happily donated his art to the clubs. And due to interest generated by these donated portraits, Chris says a chain reaction of commission work started flowing in and life as a professional artist was definitely off and running.

Chris is able to do commissions in four types of mediums-graphite, watercolor, acrylic or oil. Although Chris will work from someone else’s photography, he prefers to meet the person, to meet the dog, and to get to know the surroundings. Then he photographs the subjects—usually as many as 100 to 150 photos per painting. After downloading the images to his Mac, the magic of the design process begins. But the best part of commissioned work, Chris says, is that he gets to make new friends. “And I’m not just saying that because it sounds good,” Chris said. “It’s very true.”

Most of Chris’ commissioned paintings are of birddogs and Labradors. But there’s something special about the relationships of Labs to their owners, he says. Chris tells the story of one client and friend who keeps her birddogs in kennels, but her four black Labs share her home and sleep in her bed.

Midge is one of those black Labs. “Midge belongs to a friend of mine, Sallie Sullivan,” Chris said. “Midge is just a wonderful dog!” She is a hunt test dog, but Chris says she knows the difference between a hunt test and the real thing. During a hunt test, when Midge is sent out for a bird, she sort of strolls out and picks up the bird, brings it back casually. “But, when she’s on a quail wagon and somebody shoots a quail and then says her word, Midge jumps off that wagon like Superman,” says Chris “as fast as lightning through those Georgia pines, going after that quail! She becomes the fastest hunter in south Georgia.” Hence, the name Midge’s Passion is on Chris’ portrait of Midge with a quail in her mouth.

Right now, the Chantlands are without a dog, but they hope to resolve that situation soon. Their last dog was a black Lab named Guinness Extra Stout, from field trial stock. "We plan to get another Lab. But now," Chris told us, "'my' dogs are owned by Sallie Sullivan—they are second family to me—four black Labs and forty Pointers!"






In addition to being the Official Artist of the National Retriever Club and the National Amateur Retriever Club, Chris’s beautifully detailed and lifelike paintings are showcased in many venues across the country such as the Southeastern Wildlife Art Expo in Charleston, South Carolina, the Plantation Wildlife Arts Festival in Thomasville, Georgia and the National Bird Dog Museum, Grand Junction, Tennessee to name a few. He even has an original painting in the collection of Ted Turner.

All Labs is very proud to offer Chris Chantland’s prints in our Art Gallery and T-shirts with his images in our store. Commission requests in any four mediums-graphite, watercolor, acrylic or oil can be made directly to: ccchantland@charter.net.