ON PAINTING THE SAME SUBJECT MANY TIMES

Many painters far greater than I have painted the same subject many many times. Here is the caveat: It is not the same painting. Sometimes something new is added, sometimes something is eliminated. Sometimes the palette is different; sometimes the light source is rearranged. It is the process of arting.....For me, art is a verb. It is basically for the artist and not for the buyer that we paint; that we indulge with our communion of shapes, light and pigment. I like to paint because I like to use paint, color, and shapes probably more than I like to "say" something. From the beginning of time, the question of what do I paint is the persistent voice that a painter hears. For me it is all about what can I use to hang all this color and pigment on? Sometimes it is simply wonderful to already have a tried and true subject matter so that all my attention can be focused on the joy; the color and the light. If you google my name you will see images that have grown, changed, and morphed into other images through the prism of time. How would this scene look if it were painted in the palette of the great swedish painter, Anders Zorn? How would this scene look if I toned the canvas first with napthol crimson? How would this painting look if I only used a large brush to paint it? How about a small brush, how about if it were painted on paper rather than canvas....What if I painted this tiny corner on a huge canvas? What if I used a medium that resembles the glazes of the renaissance? THIS is why I paint. This is why I coninue.

Making your environment work

So many people are creative and yet very few make a life of it. I watched a few videos from ATOMIC HABITS on youtube recently and he continually references the idea of designing your living spaces to support your desired behaviors. How brilliant....In my new home here in Long Beach I have designed my painting area to be right down the hall in the upstairs portion of the house. THe entire room is circumferenced with narrow tables (surfaces) with the easel in the corner by the window. The center area is completely taken over by flat files which not only provide storage for prints, watercolor paper, canvases etc but offer a 32 x 48 inch flat surface at waist level for stretching canvas, organizing photos and ideas and performing general preparations. I have had many many long stretches sometimes lasting weeks where I intend to paint but don't. Somehow the day goes by and I can truthfully say that other than walking the dog and eating three meals I have accomplished absolutely zilch and go to bed feeling less than content with myself. Ah but now I have cracked the code! I wake early....I love to sit in bed and look at my ipad "stuff" for an hour or so. Because I know that I will feel GREAT all day long and go to bed content with myself if I painted that day I have decided that it is the very first thing I do so there's more DAY to enjoy in my contented frame of mind. BEFORE I wash, before I brush, before I even dress.....I shuffle into my studio behind doors 12 feet down the hall where the paints are already layed out, the brushes are clean, and the paper towels are present and begin my work.. I continue with yesterday's work or begin anew. Sometimes it's one hour, sometimes it's two. At the end of the session which corresponds with my need for food and drink, I clean my palette, wash the brushes and set up for tomorrow. I then proceed to the shower and a well deserved breakfast OR lunch. I am loving this routine not only because I have artwork to show for it but the quality of my well being for the rest of the day is A+. I am free to sew, to bake, to get lost on instagram, to watch tv, to shop, to visit, to veg out....whatever......with absolutely no guilt...I love it. All this is in the context of the sale of artwork being my sole income. I designed my space to foster a behavior that I need to do.