Monday, December 3rd: A Lesson In Failure
I am a procrastinator. I have gotten every other art project done for Christmas gifts except one. The one I've been dreading. Logic would suggest to do the "big one" first and get it out of the way. Logic and I have been battling for the past 3 months. So instead of sitting down with my oils and brushes to do the "big one," I did all the fun, little holiday projects instead. Before I get too far ahead of myself, Let me start from the beginning...
Last year my soon-to-be mother-in-law commissioned me to do a painting for her. It is to be a painting of
Chimney Rock large enough to fit over the fireplace at the family cabin. I reluctantly said yes and have been putting it off for over a year now. I have 2 main issues with this piece of artwork. 1) it is large. I have never painted anything bigger then 11x14 so to look at a canvas that is 16x20 or large is daunting. That is a lot of white space to cover up.
2) Painting mountains is not a difficult task compared to other types of landscapes...painting Chimney Rock however is a challenge. I don't normally like to paint from photographs because I feel artistically restricted and obligated to make my painting look exactly like the picture. It NEVER turns out looking like the picture...ever. However, to make the Chimney Rock Painting look like Chimney Rock I have to paint Chimney Rock. I know that didn't make a whole lot of sense. In other words I need to paint from a photograph with as much accuracy as possible so I don't make Chimney Rock look like just another mountain. Its the focal point of the entire piece so I better get it right. That's a lot of pressure...pressure I've put on myself, but still. I have a fear of disappointing my "clients."
A month or so ago, after a 2 small scale and failed trial runs I sat down to take on this terrifying task with my over sized canvas, oils, and brushes and began to paint. I finished "a" painting but it wasn't "the" painting. I stood back and looked at my masterpiece and realized it sucked. Not just a little but a whole lot of suckage. Suckity, suck, suck, sucked. I scrapped it and vowed to start over. I decided the photograph I was using that I took this past summer was one of the main problems. It was a photo of Chimney Rock and the Selkirk Mountains from across the lake. The Rock was set in the background of Priest Lake and the mountains and forested hills that surrounded it sort of took away from the focal point. After scouring the Internet, family pictures, and personal pictures of that damn Rock, I pieced them together and sketched it out onto a fresh canvas. Where it has sat...for a month.
Trail on canvas paper #2. Not
AS bad but still full of suck.
Okay. Here it is. The reason I am starting over from scratch. 16x20. It. Is. Crap.
The new "big one" will be a totally different angle. It is a look from atop the ridge to the side of Chimney Rock as opposed to the view from across the lake.
I have failed at this 3 times now. If the 3rd time is a charm, what is the 4th time?
I refuse to give up
Wish me luck....I'm gunna need it.
