Thoughts on Painting

My husband makes fun of me, rightfully so, for being sooooo directionally challenged. As does my family. Again, rightfully so. I have a 50/50 chance making a left or right turn to get me somewhere and I generally pick the wrong direction. I guess I am “The Road Less Travelled” poster child.  Which is not a bad thing. I get to see a lot of things I wouldn’t have seen had I gone the most direct, shortest way from point A to point B. I generally take the scenic route, when I can.

But in my art career, slow growth is frustrating me. As is, which direction do I go? I am having a terrible struggle between the medium I first learned 15 years ago, and my new medium, watercolor. I don’t even know why in my head I feel like I need to decide between the two. Maybe because I feel like there are not enough hours in the day to do both, or realistically even ONE. Painting requires a great time and mental dedication that completely absorbes me when I get started. And I am not great at time management, and have an adult daughter with special needs who lives with us and will probably forever, so my time doesn’t look like most of my friends who are empty nesters. But I am able to work at this as a full time job, and my husband has always been my number 1 fan and encouraged me to paint, paint, paint so I am extremely blessed with him in my corner, and cheering me on.

Lately, I am getting a lot of interest in my oils, out of nowhere. Phone calls from old collectors about new work. And I have to say, the call of getting back into oil painting is very strong right now. I also am enjoying the heck out of painting in watercolor, and appreciate the healthier studio. I don’t know if painting in watercolors was a way of avoiding the mental block I had reached in oils. I also didn’t like the solvents I was using, and really dislike the water based oil paints. I didn’t like the way they moved, or the chromas, or much about them at all. But solvents have improved, and are not even necessary if you use the right paints. I am wanting to paint like this again:

I also want to continue exploring watercolor, and I also want to continue my YouTube channel, and worry about losing my watercolor friends because it’s such a different audience, in most cases. I am loving my friends I am meeting on my channel and sharing what I’m doing in my studio! So I am going to give it a whirl, posting videos about both mediums and my work in both, and hope for the best! I hope my YT art friends continue to join me on my journey with painting! Thanks for listening to me vent, and let’s paint!!

PS…Next week I will be doing a tour of my studio out in the garage, where my oils are set up. I hope you’ll join me!