The Hideous Portrait: An Artistic Journey,
warts and all.

It's a very complicated situation, that is very very familiar. I'm observing how I'm craving to "see" (and admire) this piece over and over again - I'm somewhat enamoured to it; yesterday before going to bed I checked on it more than 5 times. Every single time, I'd be so excited and proud for it, and so disappointed after seeing that it actually doesn't live up to my expectations. It's good, it's probably the most (technically) as I can do at my current skill-level, but it's not exceptional. The colors are dull, the spaceship uninteresting, the figure mediocre but worst of all, the camera angle/fov is not dramatic enough. And yet, as soon as I close the image, my mind builds up anticipation to see it again - The realization that it's "merely ok", doesn't stick; In my imagination it lives as an idealized memory. I wonder why this happens. Perhaps working on it was so intense that my brain was wired to think it's awesom

And here we are! After a long long time not having started anything on the ipad that went beyond the stage of sketching, here is a scene with narrative. And it seems to also be the first scene I'm doing over multiple sessions - I already did two different ones today (working on the iPad is very strenuous for my body) and plan on resuming today (depending on the mood). In part the choice to work on the ipad was because I was starting to feel my "digital" work stash was staying empty, and I was tired of working with desaturated colors and my limited watercolor-mixing skills; I wanted to let loose! I'm very proud of this one. It started as a sketch, and while I was thinking that I'd do mutliple ones, I was satisfied right from the start. That is essential for my mojo since by the time I get to the second, I loose the motivation to start the painting stage! My mind's eye was vivid enough today to run composition test inside my head, so after sketching I quickl

I don't know how this happened, but apparently yesterday I forgot posting my day's artwork, something that I realized only now that I'm here to post the new work! Well, there is a first time for everything. Yesterday's piece was another watercolor exploration this time on khadi cotton paper. It's good, but can't say I prefer it the simple watercolor paper. Anyway, there are many things to like about the piece, but at the same time I can't say I'm too excited about it. It feels stagnating. There is a certain feeling of "too easy and too vague and at the same time, there is nothing interesting going on" about it. Plus I'm not liking my color-mixing skills (or I'd rather say, I'm judging myself as "not good enough and the lack of color-mixing chops is a proof"). Now having said all that, I need to remind myself that I'm here to counter this skewed perception of inadequacy (now is it?), so here are the good things of this

Very glad about today's work. It's already 5:15am, I am far past my bedtime and I still need an hour/an hour and a half before I can go to bed; but I'm not freaking out. What is more, today seeing that it was already very late and that I wanted to watch some movie or TV series episode, I decided that I wouldn't push myself too hard to paint something and instead do something minimal (merely as a gesture towards my improvement). I had a quick flash of some cartoony female bust and decided to do that and do it on paper for a change. Funnily it kept me entertained for hours and while the end result is not too great, I enjoyed the process a lot! As a piece, it's a tough sell: There is pretty nothing that I like about it (palette? composition? anatomy? face? lighting? cleanliness of line art? line-weight? none). Yet I feel that in a few months I'll be sympathetically seeing it in my stack of small paintings. For this piece I did a quick pencil(!) sketch of the face

I resumed working on the piece today, and as expected the energy was completely different. I won't say it's bad, but definitely I don't enjoy working on the piece today, like I did yesterday. Makes me wish I had more hours to work continuously. Now, the piece has reached a new state of "definition" (meaning things are getting tighter and tighter) and my efforts are focused around seperating the forms and the planes better which is not very successful. I hope I don't ruin it by the end. In any case, it's nice that I worked outdoors today, and I'm looking forward to the next piece. ;)

Today's piece has been a delight. I got up early, did some chores, photographed my last two pieces, and still had time to paint something. Despite the morning rain, by then it was over and the sun had emerged after two days so I decided to paint outside. Instead of continuing my last piece I decided to start a new one. I picked a piece of off-white 50x70cm canson paper, and went out without knowing what was to come. This is probably one of the most intriguing pieces I've ever made. It's far from done, and I dread continuing it since it was so torrental that I don't know if I'll recapture it. Then again, maybe a more tranquil day might be the best for giving shape to it. I realize how much I love drawing the human figure. While painting, other than enjoying the explosion, all I could think was "wow, I wish I had studied some anatomy; next time I should do some figure painting instead of focusing merely on the gestures). In any case, I love the figures, and the

At one point I decided to put away this piece of watercolor-paper and do sometime lazier instead. Perhaps pickup my pentel pocketbrush? Or the iPad? I quickly decided against the iPad. I had indulged in it yesterday and I've seen what happens if I stay with it too long, I lose motivation. I was looking for something more elaborate than an ink sketch, but not as tiresome as a watercolor painting. Then I remembered I could do a piece with a sole watercolor! I enjoyed the process a lot. While not the most complex thing ever, it still feels dear to me in the sense that I like a lot about it - the background, how the 3D form emerged without a sketch, the highlights, the ground. I like the interplay between light and dark - how some limbs are dark against the background whereas others are bright. I like the composition; it's not perfect, but there is the sense of the viewer coming from above and the insect becoming alert, there is some intimacy to it. I liked the process of sculpti