Canvas Anxiety

I'm trying to get some plans together, trying to gather the courage to put some paint on some canvases and submit them to a local organization that is holding a charity art show and sale in a few months. That decision made, now what to paint? 

I bought some supplies last night, feeling very brave and buoyant.  But when I woke this morning and saw the canvases leaning against the sofa I panicked a little bit. I just want to work in a smaller scale, but I know I will be pleased if I can just get over it and work on a bigger scale. I mean how many people want to stand around with a magnifying glass flipping through my sketchbook?

So, today has been about sketching and thinking, painting in miniature to prepare for the big deal. Still not sure what subject matter to focus on but I think the Aspen leaves may find a place in there.  I just love the orange against the black. LOVE. This piece is acrylic on 8x10 canvas board.  And it gives me peace.

This is a sight that does not really give me peace. Those are stacks of blank canvases and watercolor paper that I mean to fill and I hope to do so with some measure of beauty and whimsy. It makes me anxious. And that is not what art is all about for me. Art is about calm, not stress. I keep telling myself that a deadline is just what I need to get some work done. ! I put the exclamation point in my brain, just for the heck of it. But I have made a start, maybe its just the planning process, but seems somewhat more possible now than it did this morning. 

This is how my brain functions, when it DOES function. Despite appearances, this actually does organize me. The task: get the art out of those many sketchbooks and turn the reference photos into completely original works of art.

And now the reason I made a label called bad ideas. 

For the past few weeks, as I sketched and painted turtles, I thought of the turtle as a patient creature and a slow mover. This is good. This is where I need to be. I need to cultivate patience and I need to be careful about quick decisions and slingshot reactions. I kept thinking the same words over and over so I decided it would be a good idea to just write them right on the painting. With water-soluable (read smear-able) ink. After I doctored it up as much as I could with white paint this is what we have left. Not such a good idea after all. Well that is how we learn I guess.