“Yellow Cypress” 12×24, oil on panel. Buy Now
Today I put my head in my paint-stained hands, and I had a good cry at my dining room table. I’ve got three paintings on the easel none of which I can quite figure out how to resolve. I hear it. The painting-is-a-problem-to-be-solved BS I find myself using when I am most frustrated. There is not one solution, something I reflected a lot on in day 1.
I could say something like “none of which has reached the harmony I’m looking for” or “none of which are quite finished” but adjusting my language is only the first step. I’ve got some mental gymnastics left to do. I want results, dammit! I don’t have time for paintings that just “don’t work out”. Exploration is a great guiding concept until you feel up against a clock (one wholly arbitrary and of my own creation, I might add).
So here’s my day 16 painting. Last week I was in Bogue Falaya park and had my eye on one particular cypress tree whose form and colors impressed me. She was, of course, in a sea of other trees, but I wondered what would happen if I isolated just her on a canvas. This is the result. I’m not currently in a place to really assess how I feel about it yet. But it most certainly was an exploration. I used a gesso-board which is firmer than canvas, and ,much like the aqua board I used for the piano player on day 13, it drew out all the moisture from my paint. This time though, I used my trusty palette knife. The paint just kind of sits on top the surface, doesn’t smear into it. I’m not ready to say how I feel about the final result, but tomorrow you might catch me in a better mood. One can dream.
Well, first thing, I think the painting is beautiful and interesting….but I think I understand how you feel. The “none of which are quite finished” voice in one’s head comes around all too often for me. Sometimes, I know darn well where the weakness is, but I am just not good enough [well, at least for now] to know how to fix it. And sometimes, I know it is sophomoric overall, but there is also something in it that may be good and true, and that’s the worst of all….how to do service to that which is good and true, when you’re not sure if you can. But, as Lyle Lovett has said, ‘What would you be if you didn’t try…..you have to try.’ So….anyhow, count me as one who likes the painting, understanding you may return to it and render it even better.
Thank you for understanding. I might as well get the Lovett quote as a tattoo. It sums up everything.
Once again having to catch up on your blog! I really liked this one (well, I like all of them!), though I can’t relate directly, not being a painter. But I immediately thought of imposter syndrome upon reading it, a feeling I felt every day for the last four years I spent in graduate school.
I used to think that not knowing how to feel about my writing was a good thing. The feeling somehow impressed upon me the idea that a lot was going on, that I’d covered a lot of linguistic landscape. The transition to talking about your painting feels a little clunky, but I feel like a lot is going on here as well. I’m not saying it’s busy. It’s not. It’s isolated, like you described it. But all the different colors tell me you covered a lot of ground. And I love the strokes with the palette knife in the background. You put a lot into this one. In short, it’s a keeper.