More Process. I have several pieces that I am working on at the moment. It keeps me from simultaneously getting too precious with a piece, or bored, or obsessive. Sometimes, my process is all about good editing. Which I never really appreciated until my senior year of college or so. For a while, I included everything- every color, every mark, every thought. Now that I realize that whittling an image, or a line, or a shape down to it's most essential can bring out it's power and it's grace. For example, look at the brushwork in Japanese and Chinese art- volumes can be read out of one gentle stroke of ink. It's like what my teachers used to tell our English class about Edgar Allen Poe. The man was in no way verbose. Everything in his poetry and prose was absolutely essential. Airtight. Nothing gratuitous about Poe.
That may seem completely contrary to my style of late; the patterns I have been using are anything but simple. I mean- pattern is repetition- almost the opposite of simple. However, I have really been working on my editing with the Sparrow Club Chair. There were aspects of the patterns that were starting to overwhelm the whole, so I dipped my brush in black acrylic and bravely blacked out huge sections of patterns. Like using the delete button on a much too wordy sentence. In doing so, it balanced things out, made the tree really pop off the seat.
It helps to have Input. I am lucky to have Lisa working in the studio at the same time. We bounce ideas off of each other, and have mini critiques about what changes to make on our pieces. Here is a photo of Lisa working...
