Forcing the Bloom

I often wonder as I work at a piece, 'do all artists (writers, composers, sculptors, tattoo artists...) feel like they are in a complicated relationship with the creations they make?' For me, coming to the end of the execution of a piece is a lot like saying good-bye to a friend. A friend I have spent some days or months with. Someone who as a sketch or concept I may have relished and looked forward to getting to know - not always knowing what direction we might go together. Often, there are stages of excitement or the feeling of falling in love with 
a color relationship that shows up, or a mark that I don't want to forget or cover up. When this happens there is a feeling of, "Wow! This is going great, don't want this to end, etc..." But this feeling is coupled with a shaky sense of doubt: "Oh God, what if I mess this up - push it too far, or make it look forced?". Then there is the inevitable stage of "I have no talent, what in the h - e - double tooth picks am I doing?" and I come to hate the piece and myself for ever believing I could make it work. Fortunately, this is short lived and I am able to push through it to the other side. This most often happens when I am coming to the end of a commission piece. That patron (I imagine) is always looking over my shoulder, questioning every decision I make. I then go through a process of 
defending my decisions to myself (sometimes out loud), I guess I have to or I'd never finish a commission! I am grateful that exactly zero of these questions have ever actually been asked by a patron or viewer. 

The monsters stay quietly in my own head. When I deliver a commission and the patron is thrilled I am always silently shocked a bit and over joyed right along with them. Their reaction always seems more valuable to me then the check they write as payment.

I have just had the pleasure of delivering my latest commission to a family I have worked with before on two previous occasions. I love the process of conceptualizing a commissioned piece and in getting to know the families that will adopt the piece when it is finished. I worked 'Gabriel'  in the style of the work I was doing around the time I had my show in Newton - about three, four years ago.

It was fun to go back for a bit to the layers, hills, houses... Listening to the reactions of Gabriel as he got to know his personalized painting was priceless. I can only pray that he continues to reap joy from the painting for many years.

I have switched gears and am back to working on new work for the "Nurture" series. This latest piece, "Blooming Pains II" is large: 36" square. I would say that in this stage, there are things that are going in the direction I had hoped for and things I am queasy about . So, I am going along as I normally do ... partly falling in love and partly questioning my intentions at every step of the way! Business as usual - I will take it as a promising sign.

'Blooming Pains II' - in process