Clear-Eyed Thinking
It's OK to be self-critical.
When I'm in between projects, I return to my favorite subjects, the ones that present visual problems I can never quite solve. This week, that meant painting glass. Glass fascinates me because it is a technical challenge in terms of realism, but it also contains elements of abstraction. Visually, glass is a series of strange, abstract shapes that - miraculously - look like something when they come together. It's a magic trick I'm forever trying to master. I like crumpled cloth and patterned things for the same reasons. When you zoom in on the details, these objects don't look like anything, but when you zoom out, all those little stripes and ripples become a piece of fabric.
On Monday, I composed this still life with a combination of my go-to subjects.
But then, after a day of working on it, I realized I didn't like it. It felt static, despite the wild stripes, and prosaic, despite the visual complexity of the surface of the glass. I don't think every painting needs a deep meaning, but I do think they all need some little bit of mystery or interest, something that keeps you looking when you could turn away. So I added a stick. I wanted to break up the composition and lead the eye through the piece with a dynamic diagonal. I also liked the fact that the stick felt odd. It's the only organic object in the still life, and there's no narrative logic to its presence. It's just...there.
After another day of work, it still felt wrong. The colors were too dull, there wasn't enough contrast, and the glass Mason jar seemed to be floating, not grounded. Also, the highlights teetered between being too white and not standing out at all. So I kept going, making one little change at a time, adding shadows for depth, adjusting the brilliance of the colors in the stripes, and refining the shapes of reflected light.
I often hear that I’m too self-critical. But I think being dissatisfied is part of getting better. It's also gratifying. When a painting becomes a problem to be solved, the process is more engaging. Instead of, "Is it good enough?" I start asking, "Can it be better?" There's an excitement that comes from asking more of myself; I start wondering just how far I can go before reaching the limits of my own skill.
With that in mind, I welcome feedback on this piece, which may or may not be finished at this point. If you see something you would change, mention it in the comments, and I'll know that you're with me on this journey, having as much fun with the task of looking at my work as I am with the challenge of creating it.