How do we keep creativity alive when there are so many outside distractions, especially during the very busy summer holiday period?
It is easy to feel lost on return and wonder where you were going with a particular painting. This is something I find following a break and it is hard to re focus and pick up where I left. Quite often I will feel bored or uninspired at this stage and its hard to resist the urge to start a completely new body of work. Boredom and repetition can be the kiss of death to creativity, so I try and look at the painting afresh. With my current work in progress ( paintings based on night time in Santorini ) I try to imagine how I would like it to develop. Stronger design, different colour palette? Does it convey. a feeling of dusk or nightime? Does it convey mystery? What makes you. think of Santorini at night? The volcanic rock darkening in a deep Aegean sea, lit up by many dwellings some built into the rock itself? I think of the beautiful sundown time where the island is surrounded by the pinky, mauve and deepening blue sea, with the last of the sun catching the surface with its golden rays.
As you will see from photos I have approached the darker night time paintings by reversing the volcanic rock from a lighter to darker tone. Over next few sessions will aim to bring out some interesting areas to excite the eye.
The dusk paintings are being re worked with a change of design and proportion of lights to darks. Looking forward to seeing how far it can be taken……… watch this space!
You will see that I came up with idea of changing composition of night paintings by exploring the idea first on small canvas panels, shown in the bottom photo.
