the birth of a painting

i thought it might be fun to make a painting and record the progress... maybe you would like to walk with me through the process?

I first got the idea of photographing as i go from a course organised by Jeanne Oliver.

But i didn't remember this idea until i was about 4 layers in.  So forgive me that.

The painting was started with the intention that it express an experience I am building a course around...
stage 1 of the birth - conception - the intention is crucial. (the intention might just be to see what happens or it might be solid like this paintings was but there is always something that joins me when i begin with a clear intention that makes the process richer and flow more freely)

the course i am creating is called "Making Your Own Measuring Stick."  It is about learning to shift from external to internal validation

and i wanted the first painting to be about the feeling of seeking external validation.

I used colours and marks on the canvas turning it over and over a la Flora Bowley and Mystele Kirkeeng.

stage 2 of the birth - play - making marks and patterns dissolving myself in the joy of colour and trying new things.  This is crucial to me - if painting was joyless i would not do it - i want joy and play in my life- no amount of theory will help me recognise a story but playfulness and curiosity sure will)

I waited until i found some marks that made me want to listen to their story a little more and i worked until i came up with this.  On the way to this i had to cover some beautiful colours and patterns - there was even a glorious wolf in one corner that was very hard to let go of... and yet the intention kept insisting on something else.

stage 3 of the birth - being brave, saying goodbye to somethings, so that the intention may come through (this is the life death life cycle)


and this is what i gestated up to here... an angry figure with an empty space where their heart should be holding a plate in the foreground and in the background is rain - orange rain, and there are figures standing looking down at the plate..

I could feel the anger of the figure who was offering up the plate and the peering down looming quality of the figures... I kept listening

i saw figures in a row behind and decided the red figures needed to be less hot... the painting was cooling down... and the figure's anger was being replaced  she first began to kneel....

Stage 5 - listening and remembering i don't know

everyone seemed more sombre... there was a hole where her heart should be... an emptiness was ringing out

the colourful rain went and the woman became more sombre,,, the figures were bleached like bones

my brain said there needs to be more life, less white so i began to green the figures up... that should do it

no not green they said. blue.  So i made them blue... and rain fell 

and so she waits to tell me what is next....

Stage 6. waiting.