Wednesday, April 29, 2009

One step forward...two steps back


Some artists sketch out their paintings, doing studies and organizing their thoughts on paper or canvas ahead of the actual final product like wise, wise people-NOT ME! I just dive right in-some days that works like a charm...creating fresh, unpretentious ideas and concepts...and some days, like today, I curse myself to tears for not preplanning...after the self loathing, I scribble over everything, throw my paintbrushes in the sink and retire for the night...that would be right now.

On days like today, I realize I've spent hours creating something that seemed perfectly on track for a while and somewhere...along the way...things. went. terribly. wrong. One step forward--two steps back--urghhh. What was supposed to be a very warm piece turned into a TOO warm piece...or maybe I just got into a gradually cooler mood, who knows...anyway, the painting got gradually cooler until it ceased making sense and now, except for the part shown above, it's just a big mess *sigh* ...Well, maybe, just maybe I can get a nice underlayer out of it later, we'll see.

This is exactly what I mean when I say I challenge myself to find my interesting stopping point...it's knowing where to stop that makes the artist...and sometimes, when we're at that crossroads, we take the wrong path and do a full circle....better luck tomorrow.

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