Painting Take Two

Carving out time to do the things I love has finally allowed me to do what I’ve always wanted time to do – to paint.

I love to paint! But most of my experience comes from painting walls in my house.

While I’ve had acrylic sets on and off for years, they’ve only been pulled out a few times here and there. I read a book about painting, painted two paintings about 10 years ago, and then they got put away again. Then came life. And work. Then kids. And more work.

So what changed?

I finally realized that it was time to pursue my passions. While it’s been a process with many points of inspiration this year, I especially appreciate inspiration from Kelly Rae Roberts – a social worker turned artist who has shared her journey and helped other aspiring artists with her empowering words and example. It was an act of synchronicity that I learned about her work and story, after volunteering to do a pro-bono website earlier this year, right at the same time I was beginning to think about how to bring more creativity back into my life.

Starting to paint, at this point in life, can be quite intimidating. Looking at all the amazing painting that others have done can really get you thinking about how dare I try to compete with that? And while I know I am not trying to compete, and I will be happy even if I simply enjoy the process, it still can be difficult realizing just how much there is to learn and being patient with myself. I can not just pick up a paintbrush and be brilliant. I have to believe, like anything else, great results come from practice and dedication.

Last week, I pulled everything out and got a station set up for myself, put on some great music, and spent a full hour painting. And while I had so much fun in the process, the result was not much of what I had intended. I had meant to create an abstract painting of Venice inspired by a photo I had taken years ago, but I ended up with a very precise, detailed beginning of a painting. Not what I had intended at all.. and it wasn’t even close to done.

Starting my failed painting of Venice last week (but a failure is not a failure if you learn from it!)

So, this week, I decided on a different approach. If I intended to paint abstract, I needed to get more comfortable painting with feeling and less with precision. And, I needed some practice. So instead of using a photo to work from, I decided to model my painting after another painting I liked. Maybe that would help me learn the abstract techniques and look I wanted to achieve.

Experimenting with a more abstract style

Thankfully, this new approach worked quite well. I am able to paint more abstract, and probably just need a lot more practice and lots of examples of how and what to abstract from a scene. This exercise has helped me feel confidence in my capabilities, something I really need more than anything else at this stage.

A few more reproductions of artwork I like, and maybe I’ll be willing to give it a try with an original piece again.