A Year of Making Art, Day 136: When Is a Painting "Finished"?

September 2, 2007  Day 136

I thought I had moved past my drawing fog, and started this morning confidently, beginning with a series of parallel lines in an array of colors from yellow through red, to purple.  Design was still on my mind, and I continued to use these colors in a series of floral shapes radiating out from the center.  I kept working, noting that the drawing was not coming together.  I think at one point it worked fairly well, but I continued and continued, adding black lines to try to differentiate sections.  Finally, I had to stop:

   Drawing #138  14" x 11"

Our get-together with the neighbors last night went fine, of course.  They are lovely people.  Maybe I do need to do this more often in order to get past the anxiety. 

Adrian and my neighbor loved canvas #20 as it was, but I felt I had to continue it this morning.  Adrian still likes it, but I'm not sure I can think of it as "finished."

   Canvas #20  40" x 40"

(Note:  There is a gap between the dates I'm writing and posting in order to give me time to get ahead in case we travel and I'm not able to post.)