Cat Toes Studio: White Lotus In Progress, Part I

Picking up where I left off, sort of.

Despite a few interruptions and detours with other things commanding my attention, I've been working on the lotus painting. I get back there in the studio, crank up the iPod, and moosh paint around on the canvas. Sometimes I think the process of paint mooshing is the best part. Blend a little here ... drop a little of this color there ... swish in a bit of that color ... mist it all with a spray bottle and moosh some more.

Can't help it. I love blending. My lovely and impressively artistic friend, Kasey, calls me the Goddess of Blend. I admit, I like to blend. And this particular painting is all about blending on the background. Happy camper, I am.

But for snorts and giggles, I thought I would post an update on my progress. It's often hard to show 'work in progress' because, as the artist, you know so much isn't done yet. Kind of like having your date show up early and you're caught in your ratty bathrobe, legs still unshaven, half your makeup on. Nope, not pretty.

While working on a piece of art things change, they develop, and sometimes, they disappear. As you can see from this canvas, the background is still evolving. And it may very well do that for awhile. It will be what it will be until I moosh the paint into something that pleases me and I don't want to moosh it anymore lest I muck it up. It's not really a process I can explain. I either know it's working and I like it, or it's not and I don't.

Then again, it may totally and utterly frustrate me. Not unknown to happen. I could easily end up painting over parts (or the entire thing) and try again. This seems to freak some people out. I've gotten the "Oh My God! You Didn't Just Paint Over That!!!" reaction from a few people over the years and I'm never sure what to say to them. Maybe what I had painted looked good to them, but it wasn't working for me and I wasn't going to keep paddling that canoe upstream. The creation of a painting should be enjoyable, not make you want to attack the canvas with a machete.

The beginning ...