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| 18" x 24"/Charcoal + pastel |
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I often think I overwork pieces. And that desire to make adjustments or revisions confuses me. I like to consider my work an attempt to follow the example of expressionist painters and I imagine them to have worked themselves up into some sort of sublime state of nonjudgmental creative energy every time they worked and at the end they discovered they'd made something remarkable in some way or another!! And I tell myself that I am making marks just to see what happens but that notion begins to coalesce into a "plan" and there goes my "thoughtless" expression!?!
I bet they (the expressionists, e.g. Chagall) didn't actually paint that way.
With respect to the piece above, I'm going to leave it alone. I just decided.
And of course, this is a recurring theme in my blogging about my work so please indulge me, if you will.
2 comments:
First off, I think this portrait is quite charming, and it looks to me like you stopped at the right point.
I think there is something about expressing humanity, rife with imperfections as we are, that is so much more interesting than drawings that are "beautiful" and totally resolved. This unpolished approach leaves breathing room for the viewer, and suggests a compassion for the "works in progress" that we all are.
So, tonight I learned that my application to a figure show in Gloucester (one I really wanted to be included in) was passed over and I get this from you! What you said is what I feel. Thank you so much!!
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