Tuesday, January 8, 2013

30 in 30 Days - Day 7 - Winter Icing


Acrylic on 8x10 canvas panel
Available through DPW gallery/auction

Named this "Winter Icing" because of the layering of snow on the trees & grounds. Just wanted to do a painting that showed how a heavy snowfall would look at one of the creeks. 

I've learned a few things with this challenge that I wasn't expecting to learn, and they aren't really in regards to painting - well, not directly. 

First, landscape paintings are not as viewed, commented, and I suppose, liked, as perhaps still lifes, people, etc. I've done landscape paintings for the past 7 days, and their views are less than some of my other subjects. I don't know if anyone else is tiring of them, but I am a bit. So the next couple of paintings I think I will venture into more closeups, nature still lifes, etc. I will probably circle back to landscapes again, before this challenge is over. I still want to work with snow - I haven't gotten tired of that! In fact, I purchased a large tube of white. I don't usually use white alone (I did in some of this painting), but I use it to mix quite a bit in these snow scenes. Thought it would be good to stock up on my white before it's gone!

Second thing I learned is that you really need to post your paintings over on Leslie Saeta's blog earlier in the day if you want to drive more viewers to your work. Yesterday was the first day that I went back to work, and so I can now only post at night. And yesterday, my viewer count on my blog was drastically lower than the previous 6 days when I posted in the afternoon (I wonder if it would be even higher if I posted in the morning). The difference is very noticeable.

Lastly, I learned that 30 paintings in 30 days is probably not the best thing I could have signed on to right now. I am having trouble finding time to paint during the week, mostly because of work demands - and the commute. It is now 10:10 pm and I have yet to prepare a purchased painting to be sealed & seal it. Mount another purchase on hardboard, update this blog, Leslie's blog & the DPW website with todays painting. And all before I can sketch or paint. 5:30 am comes around pretty quickly.

So I thought that maybe not doing all 30 paintings would be a good compromise, but the competitive side of my personality is now calling me a failure. Long story short, I'm starting to stress out over the whole thing. There was a time in the past, where I was signing on to do a lot of challenges. And I had a book that I used to keep track of them, what their "assignment" was, and when they were due. I did it for a couple of months until one day, I woke up and my muse was gone. All desire & love of painting was no where to be seen, and I was so sad & depressed for a few weeks. Given time, it came back, but I realized then (and do again) that when it starts to be about "producing the art" instead of "the art" - then it isn't doing anything positive.

I started this week with 4 paintings ahead, I am now down to only 2 ahead. If I don't get something new painted in the next couple of days, I will come up short on Friday. I guess if that happens, then so be it. This project was so much easier, and enjoyable, when I was home all last week and had the time. I'll see how things progress, maybe I'm simply having a bad day!


4 comments:

Autumn Leaves said...

I know exactly what you mean about trying to paint around work. I'm in the same boat and when I last signed up for a major project (Sketchbook Project), I quickly lost mojo just from stress. Unfortunately, work has to happen for me so the art comes second.

Paintings said...

Paintings I LOVE the Snow White painting!!! Do you know of anywhere where I could buy a print?

Nan Johnson said...

Thanks Sherry. I think I found a solution - go small! I'm doing some 3x5 inch canvas's now with simpler designs. I'll still do some bigger ones, but will mix in the smaller ones. (and I found the Sketchbook Project a bit much also!)

Hi Paintings, thank you for your comment. I sell my originals through Daily Paintworks, this one is in an auction now. When it's over, I will upload a high res version of the image to Fine Art America - which is where I sell the prints and cards. There is a link to both on the right hand side of my blog. Thanks again for your comment, very much appreciated!

Sea Dean - Paint a Masterpiece said...

I just thought I'd let you know that my stats at DPW and blogger are showing almost the opposite of your findings. Perhaps it's not Landscape that's the problem (I think yours are beautiful) but it's that people don't want to be reminded of snow, unless it's the fun aspects like skating, skiing etc. By the way, if you would like a tip, when your blog comes through in the email only the name of your blog appears, you have to click into your blog and then into other pages to see who you are. I run an Art Marketing group on Facebook (Get Your Art Out There) and this is an absolute faux pas for Artists. Your Artist name must be put in front of buyers constantly to get it into their "little grey cells".

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