Do all paintings turn out the way the artist wants? Is there such a thing as a “bad” or “good” painting? I think so!

My Burn Pile

My husband hates when I give him paintings for the burn pile. He thinks they can be saved, restored, reworked so that they can become what they should be. I don’t see things quite the same way. However, to me these are not failures. They represent a new technique that I’m trying to learn or perhaps a new challenge I’m bravely facing. It is all practice for the masterpiece to come.

The Life Cycle of a Painting

I believe some pretty crazy things and this is one; each painting has a Life Cycle. If you have ever painted before you may have experienced this. You get an idea, you get excited, you visualize the finished painting, you wake up thinking about it and you can hardly wait to get started. So you jump in with enthusiasm and it starts off great. Then something takes your focus away from your project. Maybe life gets in the way, maybe you have to leave it for a period of time and “whosh” that excitement to finish the painting is gone. Once you look at it again you just can’t get into it in the same way. You have moved on and the painting has moved on. I have quite a few unfinished paintings in my studio. The life cycle came to an end for these paintings.

Currently Rick and I are doing a clearing out of our attic and sheds and I looked at some of the half finished paintings and thought, “I should try these again.” Then I checked how I really felt about it and realized, no, I would be forcing the completion of the paintings out of some sort of obligation not from any creative source. Time to let them go.

Overworking The Painting

Here is a great example of overworking a painting. I worked on this painting on and off for two weeks. It was painted at least 4 four times. I hate it! A bit strong of an opinion you ask? No! It just wasn’t working and I should have stopped long before I did, in fact, because I didn’t stop painting it I came to “strongly dislike” the painting.

People who have seen it have told me there is nothing wrong with it. I see everything wrong with it. The apple tree didn’t work out and the more I worked it the worse it got. Then there is the grass which looks “fake” and again, the more I worked it the more “muddy” the colours became. What should I have done? Stop, chalk it up to a learning experience and start a new one. Not every painting needs to work, should work or will work and guess what? It is OKAY! It is not a failure. If every painting worked what would we learn? Also, it keeps me humble. I have so much learning to do and so far to go. I love a challenge.

Paintings That Did Work

I did have some success since being home from my holiday. Always a good thing. Here are some pictures of paintings that did work! I’m excited about these new works as they represent my favourite things…..Killarney, camping and Italy!

This painting is available at Loft Gallery

Upcoming Workshop July 15th

Upcoming Workshop This Fall…

To find information on these classes please look under the Workshop Category.

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