End of last week I was working diligently on my project which requires an ambitious amount of realism and accuracy and I was st-ressing. You can see increased focus on perspective in the Windmill and Clock references, if you compare them to previous renditions.
But like I said, I was stressing about realism and feeling bad when I thought about painting, thinking I had to be practising and learning and serious… which of course means I’d just end up not painting at all. So I decided I’d freestyle some other shit and that’s what you see with the final two pictures – both are referenced from illustrations (one’s a self portrait by Lucian Freud) And it was such a relief.
I like my work sketchy and weird, even the Clock is still sketch-like even though I was aiming for more realism – which I know is odd because it’s a surrealist picture but I mean in terms of weight and light and stuff.
That Windmill reference is such a bane to me. It never looks good or accurate. It’s getting better but it’s not good yet at all. It’s really really tough because it’s a foggy sunrise and it’s a fucking epic picture but so fucking hard to capture.
So yeah, I’ve revived some playful love of painting and the realism project is of course stalling.
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