My goal for this painting is to be better. Better than what I know I can do. I know I can paint from a picture or work with a projection comparing and working upside down, squinting, stepping back and work at lights and darks with relative shapes until it’s good. However, there is an elephant in the room.
I am going to look the elephant in the face and say, “I am moving my painting away from the window and putting it in front of the piano!”
Go, Brave Hilma!
The biggest mistake/deal breaker/“artist maker” = doing what you know to be right. If I hear my teacher’s voices say, “Work from real life” and I refuse to do it and sit comfy in my chair lying to myself and my viewer, I’m not going to improve. Improving is everything. Don’t underestime someone’s or your own aptitude to improve. The skill to learn will enable a person to literally do anything.
Key to success: make goals and learning public and celebrate learning and make the hard parts celebrations of good choices.
Party time!
This is how I do it:
In five minutes after making this change, all the black parts in the pic I was looking at now made sense: what direction they were going, how they’re connected and wayyyyy more details that I can use to describe slabs of brown wood.
Here I found a ukulele in my daughter’s room and redid it in my painting. I can see there’s not quite enough black space under it yet. Looks way better smaller and at an angle.
worked on keys marking each section with a toy and making a slight mark representing the toy on the painting cuz i was getting all mixed up and didn’t want it to look too messy.
Painting from real life is where it’s at! If you have a “question”, you can “answer” it. For example, “Where does that line up?” Then, you move over and look. I placed markers and made representative marks on my painting to keep track of the 88 keys. I found that my legs were in the wrong spot.
When the painting gets closer and closer to reality, you’ll feel a click! It’s like, “yeah!” God, I live for that feeling. May I say that it kinda becomes real and time in the milliseconds is meddled with? It kinda feels that way. Like, there’s this small moment where I’m in control and the ages are listening. Sounds crazy, but I wanted to share because I hope to help others by explaining why I work all day and how I am able to create.
