one happy week

This week I painted from memory. No reference photos, no plein air painting. It was freeing and exciting and was reminiscent of the year or so I spent on abstracted work. Very fun.  I focused on the nuance of a memory-scene and stopped before my usual addition of details. The photo above will give you an idea of the paintings (sorry about the reflections, especially on the center one).

I found a way to trick myself into stopping before the urge to add detail takes over: I selected four older paintings, and each day I took one of them out of its frame, repainted a scene from memory, stopped BEFORE I felt I was done and put it back in the frame. My thought was that I'd just look at them for a while then unframe them, paint a little more and photograph them. However, once one was framed and I went on to the next, I began to forget what I was going to "fix" and now I'm happy with them just the way they are. Certainly happier than I would be if I had overworked them.

Today's painting, "Bejeweled," was a different story. I painted it once yesterday, wiped it off. Painted it again this morning, began to photograph it, then fixed one little thing...then another...wiped the whole thing off and painted it again this afternoon. Now it is sitting in the frame while I think about it.  If it survives, I'll post it soon. I've had a happy painting week.