Eye-to-eye, Side-by-side: A question of completeness

I struggle with admitting that a painting is spontaneous. I am worried people will see less value in it when I do. This has more to do with my evaluation of the works I make. I get into a great inner-discussion to remind myself of how long I’ve stared at the blank canvas, researched and daydreamed ideas for the work, and the (sometimes dozens of) hours spent visualizing the painting before the first drop of paint touches the canvas. And still, I am afraid to call it a spontaneous work. Perhaps because it never is!

I intended to make a blurry layering for this profile and quickly realized I was making multiple profiles, one slightly offset from the one behind it. It was the elongated eyeball that solidified what I was doing. It feels like two people marching together for a shared cause. That feeling added some social tension to the work and the titles that came all felt like cultural appropriation and white privilege tripe. I decided to look inside for the message I wanted to share. It was the feeling I had of being side-by-side and sharing the same vision.

I used my pallet knife on this one to make the face and wanted to layer in some contrasting colour over the yellow gesso. I just wasn’t sure what colour too use. All the blues and indigos felt wrong. I remembered advice from a mentor to let things be and not overwork it. So, I’m sharing it with you in this state, fully accepting that the question to leave it as is or continue is yet to be answered.

I’ll let you know…