I have painted since I was a little girl, on and off. I taught myself to use oils from one of those Walter Foster paperback books. I thought painting in oils proved you were an artist. Ha! Well, I was only a kid. I did pretty good stuff, and wonder what landfill base it forms today.
My paintings were always representational and I aimed for realism. I got better at it the more I painted, handling the paint, figuring out how to glaze, etc. In the last year of my undergraduate degree I went to see an exhibit of Chuck Close's paintings at the old Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago and that ended my interest in realism. Here is a painting of Kate Moss, as if we need to see anymore of her face...
You really can't get much better than this. Then to make matters worse, he devised an even more interesting looking result with pattern.
I LOVE these kinds of paintings. Did I mention they are huge?
Anyway, I quit painting then. Just quit. Got my painting degree, packed up my canvasses and started making my first quilt.
But I hated being a quitter. That's Q U I TT E R, not quilter. I love being a quilter. But still there is that need to paint in the old soul and so I gathered new supplies and huge primed canvasses (on sale at Joann's where I was already gathering yarn, O geesh) and got back into painting. You who read this blog have seen this happen this year, and last.
Well, I had to clean up my studio from this week's great giveaway mess and what to do with my canvasses?? I have a couple of finished paintings, in no way gems, and I have no place to put them, since they aren't wall worthy. They could be painted over, since I am striving to get something different than what I have painted on the first go round.
Learning means moving past the first several attempts, and I have learned it is often try try again before satisfying results appear.
So I have found a safe dry place for the canvas, under the stairs . Right next to the boxes of Christmas ornaments and the fake trees. It is just a teeny bit difficult to extract one canvas without moving a few other things first. You can bet that it will take more than a whim to get me to pull one out.
The same goes for the yarn that I neatly gathered into multiple Rubbermaid bins yesterday. I was going to sort them by type and content or color, but eventually I just threw on the lids and stacked them on the shelves.
The whole idea was to have a way to use these supplies easily and have a place to keep them protected and off the floor. I don't think I have conquered this challenge yet.
This kinda reminds me of a story my dad always told me from his years in art school. One of his teachers had the class spend a considerable amount of time on a drawing, and then when they thought it was finished, he made them erase it, turn it upside down and start fresh on a new drawing. The aim? To not treat our art as too precious to rework. I think you should slap a bit of primer on your not wall worthy canvases and start fresh when the inspiration hits. Maybe the bits of the old paintings showing though will add a richness or inspiration to the new. Yea, me and my two cents, what do I know? I do think of the story every time I contemplate ripping out stitches in a quilt though. When in doubt, rip it out (or cut it up)!
ReplyDeleteThis kinda reminds me of a story my dad always told me from his years in art school. One of his teachers had the class spend a considerable amount of time on a drawing, and then when they thought it was finished, he made them erase it, turn it upside down and start fresh on a new drawing. The aim? To not treat our art as too precious to rework. I think you should slap a bit of primer on your not wall worthy canvases and start fresh when the inspiration hits. Maybe the bits of the old paintings showing though will add a richness or inspiration to the new. Yea, me and my two cents, what do I know? I do think of the story every time I contemplate ripping out stitches in a quilt though. When in doubt, rip it out (or cut it up)!
ReplyDeleteYou didn't really say what made you quit. Where these so good you felt that they couldn't be bettered? You often talk about realism in a not so complimentary way, I wonder why it still bothers you? Personally the painting of Kate Moss is exactly what I don't like about realism. Copying the out of focus quality that only a camera can see - why bother painting it? But realism is not a Bad Thing. It's just not your thing. I don't do abstract but I don't slag it off. Every well executed art work enriches our lives in some way, show us the world through anothers eyes.
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