'Listening'
Oil/ Glaze on Canvas
36" x 48"
2013
This work was a wonderful lesson in listening, hence it's title. Many times I brought it out to continue working on it as it is only a few layers deep and a lot of my work is quite dense in layering. Each time I went to work on it, it literally spoke to me and said it was complete. I battled with this for a while as I loved the composition as it is but there are usually many 'stopping points' along the way in my work and I keep going with the layering to discover more. I often lose a work for a time and then it returns somewhere along the way, I have come to expect it as part of the process. There are nights when I leave the studio sure a painting is complete and then in the light of day decide to continue exploring and building, revealing, concealing until another stopping point arises. It is knowing which stopping point signals true completion that is interesting. This work spoke of completion well before my normal process would. I am so pleased I listened and resisted the temptation to build some more. It has an ethereal beauty and calmness in the energy it exudes. It is now hanging in a music studio here in Dallas and the title and the lesson it taught me seems so apt for a room dedicated to the purpose of creation. I hope it inspires many a beautiful song.