“A cougar, one of the most secretive of animals, here has followed a quarry, perhaps a deer, which has wandered into a clearing. The cougar is now lying watching it, hesitant about making a dash into the open to attack its prey. In this painting I was seeking a mood of mystery and tension, which I established with the diagonal structure of the twigs and branches. These set up a sort of field of electric sparks around the cougar, emphasizing the direction of its gaze.”

Robert Bateman describing another of his Cougar works illustrated in The Art of Robert Bateman (1981).