2021 in Pisticci….portraits and more DIM.

And horrible weather all day. Cold, foggy, rainy and windy.

Lit my stove around 9am and it’s been on all day. Bliss!!!

My plan was to start the next portrait commission and see if I could get both faces done. The faces measure approximately 9cm from chin to top of head.

I learned something important today I think.

Because the reference photo is not very good then I knew it would be difficult. It’s necessary to be as exact as possible when detail is blurred, as usually what looks okay on a tiny phone photo looks very different when enlarged. At least this time the faces are still relatively small.

I quite enjoyed the challenge and think I have made a reasonable job so far.

What occurred to me was that treating today’s work as difficult was okay. I didn’t feel particularly stressed and was quite relaxed.

After watching a lot of videos on youtube recently where the artists make painting look easy I have been feeling worse and worse about my work.

I have been painting regularly now for about 20 years. I’ve painted hundreds of portraits , street scenes, landscapes and various other things. You’d think I would know what I am doing by now and it would be easy, but it’s not.

I’m still surprised when a painting looks okay. And recently I haven’t thought even that .

Sometimes I wonder if it’s because I never went to art college or had any real training in drawing or painting. I don’t come from an arty family and if it hadn’t been for James and moving to Italy where he told everyone that I was an artist and I couldn’t do any other work then maybe I would have stopped painting years ago.

But it has just gradually taken over my life and now painting is responsible for how I feel about myself, making some sort of a living and a great deal of my social life.

No pressure!!!

However today when I didn’t think it would be easy then for the first time in ages I enjoyed myself.

Must remember that ……. .

I didn’t do much else today which was nice. I initially tried to set up and paint in my living room near the stove but after my palette fell onto the floor….paint side down of course….and I had cleaned that up I realised there was nowhere to put my tablet where I had my reference photo.

I gave up and moved everything back to my colder workroom.

On a good day I like to say that my house is well ventilated ……today it was just very draughty.

The doors are pretty but have lots of gaps and the curtain between the 2 parts of my house blows back and forwards.

I put a curtain over the back of my post box which helped a little bit.