Getting Ready to Paint

I love to paint!  I get excited when I smell oil paint and turpentine.  I look at other people's paintings and I think, "I really want to get started on a painting.  I can hardly wait to get started."

So, why is it so hard to actually get it started?  I finished the church newsletter yesterday, which means I earned the right to celebrate and my choice of celebration is to do some oil painting.  But first, I had to choose a subject to paint. That took me a long time this morning.

Now I have my choice.  It's the back entrance to a cottage at Miracle Mountain Ranch. 

The scene is against a woody area of tall trees. There is a tall, wooden fence with the gate open and a stone path leads through the fence.  In front of the fence is a bed of wild flowers.  There's a wonderful assortment of greens, the fence is painted gray and the wild flowers are shades of pinks and reds with blue morning glories climbing the fence at one place.  It should be fun to do.

The next step was to scan my photo and crop it to show just what I wanted to paint. Then I enlarged the picture and printed it.

So now I'm ready to get out the oil paints, and the canvas, set up the easel and get started. But now it's time to get dinner!

However, I've learned by experience that if I jump into a painting without thinking it through first, I'm disappointed that I didn't plan it well enough.  I've slowed my process today, putting off the enjoyment of brushing paint on canvas until I'm more sure of just how I'm going to begin.  I may not get to the paint itself until Thursday morning.  Slower is better, and I want this to be a better painting.  Anticipation is part of the enjoyment.

Posted by: NJ on 1/27/2004 2:47:01 PM , 3 comments