Reflections

The big green wave I painted over the summer was my (patiently) rushed, and annoyed, response to losing the best paintings I'd ever done (imo) in the studio fire in June. I tried to reproduce and improve the one which I was most upset about losing. While I was still upset about it.

It has some things that are improved (technically), I think, but lacks the gentleness of the original. I needed to get it out of my system. The slightly more aggressive contrasts are probably a reflection of how I was feeling.

Compare and contrast.

Having said that, I like it, and it served a purpose. Pushed me a bit, technically, but as Frank Drebin said; "you can't go back."

Once I finished that, I felt crushed, physically and mentally, for a few weeks. "What had happened" finally sank in, and I was exhausted and listless... other things happened too that didn't help (good friends dying). Not a good time.

I struggled to explain to anyone what was wrong, but I felt terrible and wanted to sleep all day long. It’s tiring being emotional (I blame this on being a man and having underdeveloped emotional intelligence: I can do it, but it’s exhausting). If anyone asked me about the fire, I didn’t really talk about it, except trying to sound positive. Yeah I know that’s not how you’re supposed to do it, but I was too tired to do anything else.

June. This was annoying.

As winter started, I was coming back to life a bit. I agreed to do a little solo show in May 2025, which gave me a deadline, and I found I could think about new paintings again. 

I know what I want to do, what colors I'm exploring... and I'm trying hard to keep pushing the details:

Better processes, cleaner painting and so on. Slowing myself down with intention, to counter the impatience I still feel a bit. Getting lost in the little details feels good.

I hope this will result in an interesting series of paintings. I'm trying to listen to inspiration, despite aggravating noise in my head... I'm kind of "trusting the process", the inspiration, and ignoring my irritated emotions as far as possible. Discipline, boringly, helps a lot.

So far I've mixed my color palette, and have prepared two canvasses with backgrounds. In Autumn 2023 I changed how I paint backgrounds, and little by little I've been growing with confidence. With these two I finally feel like I know what I'm doing, what happens and why. So I feel in control. As with everything I do in painting, the "better" I get, the more complicated and slow my process becomes. I love it. I left the studio one evening with a canvass still drying, and when I returned the next day to find it had come out really well, some of my frustration evaporated. I am enjoying working again :)

It's good to be painting with my friend Marc; his warmth (and also work ethic!) keeps me going when I sometimes don't want to.

Oranges on the way, and maybe blues later, unless something else occurs.

BTW: I’m aware this is all me me me - other people have had worse things happen. I’m still a very lucky and privileged person. And I have been surrounded by support and kindness, for which I am very grateful.

postscript: This may not seem like it was written by someone who is a professional writer - I have consciously decided to throw writing discipline out of the window when writing for myself, so if you’re unfortunate enough to be reading this; bad luck!