It’s okay to start over

2019 was the year when I found this giant 36”x48” canvas. At a steal of a price too!! It was only $20. I had a general idea of what I wanted to paint but nothing super concrete. Should have stopped right there and worked this out in my sketchbook but I am impatient and I wanted to get messy so I went in with a very weak concept. The painting changed many times until it reached a stage that I was happy with. That stage where I was actually happy with the concept emerged recently, in the last month. I did not work on the painting consecutively since starting in 2019. It was on and off. I took a long extended break before the 2020 holidays and did not really return to it until recently.

The recent concept, when I finally picked up a brush again, made me excited. It’s very personal and maybe one day if I ever finish this concept, I will share what it means to me.

The other day, I was in the process of fixing the colors and finally starting the details but something was really nagging at me. You can actually see it in the next to last image below, the dreadful marks on the body. They were there not on purpose but they were from previous ideas and laying on paint too thick. It was really irritating that the surface was not smooth. I decided that I was going to try and “save” this painting by taking off the first layer of paint. What a mistake that was because it turned into a disaster! I was so upset for even thinking of that because now the painting was basically ruined. In one spot, I ended up damaging the canvas. Basically, there was no going back.

I don’t know why I was clinging on to the idea of “I must keep going!”. There was no pressure on me and I had no deadline. I decided I would give up on this one and chalk this up to practice. The concept is there now, I know where I want it to go so it was time for this to go. Not going to lie, cutting the canvas off the frame was a little sad because this was a labor of love but it needed to go.

Long story short, I ordered canvas fabric, which will be here next week and I can start over again. I look forward to now working on something with a strong concept and I am genuinely excited about it. It’s okay to start over.

“Isn't it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?”

― L.M. Montgomery

You can see the messy progression or shall I say regression of this painting below.