WIP
Everything changes; Nothing is destroyed.
WIP is a ‘Work in Progress’ in the jargon of creators. I love how that can describe an unfinished project or a developing child, a budding relationship or a brand new idea.
When I first started painting with watercolors and acrylics, I was fascinated with what appeared during each session of a new piece. Whether letting colors float into each other on their own, or directing them deliberately, I noticed how they mingled, interacted and changed. I watched layers gain strength and form new colors and shapes...new ideas.
It was quite a while before I attempted a realistic painting. My excuse was that I have always had weak visual memory. So there is not already a picture in my mind, for example, of an elephant. But I know and love everything about elephants…their size, their ears, trunk, memory, empathy, intelligence, their way of communicating…I hear them lowing and grumbling to their young, and trumpeting news across the Serengeti.
So I found a photo online of a family of four elephants at a water hole. First I established the ground and the forest in the background, then took them one at a time and hoped for the best. Finding the gestures of their bones was a thrilling discovery that practically put me in a trance…I didn’t know before the brush picked up paint and went to the canvas, what it would ‘do’ or how it would ‘look.’
During breaks to let things settle and dry I took photos of different sections and orientations of the canvas. I called them ‘slices’. They were part of the whole work, but I was surprised to see they were also interesting independent compositions.
I think that's completely amazing. And the sensation of physical connection is too cool!
Thanks for sharing the process! I really loved seeing this. We all see the world in so many different ways and in stages all our lives--your WIP is a synthesis of a much broader application.