Bout time I got back on here , and said something. The exhibition went really well thanks to everyone who helped and particularly all who bothered to come along and have a look, and of course to all who bought or commissioned something!
I was so apprehensive beforehand, but it all turned out to be .....well....fun. I will get the commissions done next, but have a lot of ideas and plans for the next lot of more personal paintings.
There was something very strange about seeing all the paintings I'd picked out to show, all together "in the flesh", and at first I felt very exposed and scared. The thing is though, once the work is finished it's nearly as if I had nothing to do with it any more, and it's grown up and standing on it's own for other people to love, hate, puzzle over or dismiss as they will. On the other hand, I remember each step of the making of it, almost to the extent of recalling every stroke of the brush. Paul Klee once said something to the effect that the artist is like the trunk of a tree, the inspiration and ideas are the roots of the tree, drawn up through the trunk, and the branches and leaves are the actual work. To me that describes the process with uncanny accuracy, except for the inconvenience of a tree being a single entity!
I finished this painting very recently, and will be doing more as I still have a fascination for glimpses of camp life that may be either up to date or a look backwards into the past. Some of the past life seems so remote now that it might belong to another era, and is almost like a half remembered dream, but some other things are vivid and present (or maybe I'm just getting old!) One thing's for sure, life never stays the same.
The painting above is an oil painting 18 x 27 in. It's been sold.
