day #365 - the end of an era

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I thought I was on top of it; I had finished early and was looking for a movie to watch already 3 hours ago. And I don't know how time went by. A phonecall, some networking studying, some online shopping and here we are, already past the time for an early movie. Regardless, today is a special day. The blog is over! I finished 365 days of daily painting and recording it, whatever that means. A big part of the process I will have to keep doing mainly for myself. Perhaps taking daily photos of my work and saving it on some folder. This has provem useful many times when I trying to date a piece I've been working on. Also making a small diary of today's achievements. It's still useful. But this will be done for my eyes only. I also don't know if I will be continuing my obsessively daily painting. How would life be if I had days off? Now for example that I'm moving out and I have to daily chores that until now were completely taken care of, perhaps I'll allow my
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day #45 - Papasmurf's insomnia

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And here we have it, not too many days later; waking up after 3-4h of sleep. I decided to so some studies. I like the word "studies", it sounds as if you get deeper into something, that you are serious.
At the same time, I hate the work. I always hated the idea of repeating something twice. Same vacation destination, same movie twice, same book twice, same course twice, same painting theme  twice, same lecture twice. It feels that I'm incompetent not being able get something right the first time. Then again, I'm learning ways to cheat it. Practice perspective multiple times, but spice it up.

Anyway, these self-portraits are a very peculiar thing. I haven't been repeating things other than exercises like the aforementioned. And here I am, still drawing the same torso and face, same hour of the day, same spot. Today I wanted it to be some quick value sketches. I tried approaching measurements from different angles (haha - haha, get the pun?). I'm quite satisfied with everything. The first values thumbnail feels nice, the sketch to the right looks well proportioned, and the 3rd one while too long is ok too.

And then we have papa-smurf; that I like best. I remember a teacher saying "it's one thing seeing a red tunic and painting a red tunic, and another [more difficult perhpas?] thing seeing a red one and painting a blue one. I've kept it close at heart, unquestioned since I've always cared about depicting that which is not. And here it is, drawing me blue! Krishna, papa-smurf, or simply choosing a random color and then trying to do the value and hue shifts around that particular color. I think it's rather successful and at the same time satisfies a 20 years old directive: Paint the tunic blue.

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