If you think that I start with a fully formed idea every time and that’s what comes out, nothing is further from the truth. This is the perfect example. What I started out trying to do was going to be an extremely simple black and white with the only thing being the boat, and a few plants. A very minimalist piece but the more I worked on it the more it didn’t look right. I added the moon. Then it didn’t look right being mostly white. I colored it a bit to a dark blue for a night scene. I added some trees and a bird or two. Then the fog. It finally began to look right. Not look like what I intended to make, but it just kinda told me what to do til it told me it was done.
It reminds me of cooking in the South. They say that when we spice a food, our long-gone ancestors stand over our shoulder until its right, then whisper “That’s enough, dear. You’re done” and that’s when we know the seasoning is right. Often times I feel like that’s true for both my cooking and my art.