I'm not one of those artists who can finish a painting and call it 'done', and move right along to the next one. I wish I was. I envy them - they know who they are.
For me, it's a constant quest for that 'perfect painting', which can never quite be attained. Even after a painting is 'finished', it's still fair game for further work ... sometimes just a slight colour or value adjustment, sometimes a more intensive 'overhaul'.
Perhaps it's the old maternal instinct speaking up - you don't just birth them and let it go at that ... it's a matter of nurturing and guiding them as they grow, adapting to keep up with the times, making adjustments based on new lessons learned and new information gleaned and new experiences acquired. Just as it was with raising children, so it is with creating art. At least that's the way it is for me.
This year I've been spending a fair amount of time on reworking paintings done at earlier times, mostly those done within the past couple years, but a few older ones too. This one I first did many years ago in Oil, but I felt the need to let the pencils play with it as well, so in 2008 I did a Coloured Pencil version. The following year I did some touch-up work on it, and it has sat around since then.
It never quite measured up to what I'd originally envisioned when I first set pencil to paper, so this year it was back to the drawing board again. I examined it once again, with fresh eyes and more experience under my belt, and had another go at it.
The result this time is much closer to my original intention, and I'm fairly pleased with it. Nothing about it jumps out at me and screams "Fix Me!!"
I think I might leave this version alone - at least for now.
