I drew this fox as a rough for my children’s picture book Deep in the Wood in 1987. I prefer this pencil on layout paper version to the pen and watercolour of the finished illustration. Construction lines always add some animation to a drawing. There’s an extra-heavy outline where I traced out the image onto the watercolour paper that I used for my final artwork. I rubbed pencil over the back of the layout paper.
Deep in the Wood is about animal senses and this fox appears towards the end of the story to illustrate the sense of smell. It’s pausing to take in the scents of shrew, humans and blackberries that are wafting through the wood in the evening.