The following are some of the frequently asked questions about Buddy and his paintings.

Q: Does Buddy really paint?
A: Yes, he holds the brush in his mouth and moves his head to make brush strokes on the canvas.

Q: Why don’t you use an artist easel for Buddy to paint on instead of holding the canvas for him?
A: Buddy is boarded at a public boarding facility that I do not own so I cannot keep an object like this where he is located and it is hard to move from my home to the barn every time I want to paint with him. He also tends to push hard on the canvas when he paints, so he would need a heavy-duty easel. Eventually, once we have land for him to be at home on, we will build his own “studio” for him to paint in.

Q: How did you teach Buddy to paint?
A: I taught Buddy to paint by using clicker training and positive reinforcement. I started with having him hold an object in his mouth and then moved on to him moving the object with his mouth and then to place it onto the canvas. He then moved on to an actual paintbrush with paint. He is very smart so the learning process was very quick.

Q: What research program do you donate to and how much is donated?
A: At the moment we are donating 10% of Buddy’s profits to research being done at the University of Tennessee. They are currently doing a study on Cushings and environmental influences that effect horses with the disease. Buddy is participating in this study so we felt it was a good place to start with his donations. The remainders after the 10% donation goes to cover the cost of art supplies and to pay for the cost of Buddy’s continued care, vet bills, and medications.

Q: Why did you teach Buddy to paint?
A: I taught Buddy to paint because it seemed like a fun thing to do. I had a bunch of unused canvases laying around that I didn’t see myself using anytime soon, so I figured I would try to teach him to paint to use them.

Q: Why do you sell Buddy’s Paintings?
A: I sell them because there is a demand for them. What started out to be “just for fun” turned into people asking to purchase the paintings as soon as they were finished. When he was diagnosed with Cushings Disease, I realized we could do some good with his paintings by selling them and then being able to donate to a good cause to help other horses who have Cushings. My husband and I then created the website for buddy to showcase his artwork and to make it easy for people to see the new paintings he made. I was also a recently graduated college student with not a whole lot of extra funds and I needed to come up with a creative way to be able to afford to keep Buddy with all of his excess medical bills.

Q: Why don’t you have a video of him painting? How do I know Buddy really painted them?
A: We do not currently have the ability to put video online. The equipment we have is not good enough to have a good enough quality to get videos online so we are waiting until we have the ability to do so. There are several pictures available for viewing that shows the entire process of him painting. If you do not believe the pictures, you’ll just have to take me at my word.