Hellas, I am humbled by the depths you go to gather feedback about my artwork. Your adjustments to my work, especially the 'background', and the feedback you got from your friends about the before, after, and my 'solution' were powerful. I had to digest what you were saying for a few days, not because I was offended; more that what you said and how you said it made so much sense. I could SEE your points about each painting. Digesting the feedback drove me to thinking about what I wanted to do about it after I first entertained that I should quit painting, which was a brief and ridiculous reaction. I paged through Pinterest to Pin artwork I like and think about why I found each piece appealing. I watched how-to videos to see what I was doing wrong. But I kept coming back to your post where you wrote that one of your friends said that, to work abstractly, I should keep visual references to recognizable things to a minimum.
I went to my home library in my studio and picked up a book I've had for awhile but hadn't got past the first exercise in painting abstractly. Dean Nimmer is the author. The first exercise is to make eleven dots on a blank sheet of paper and connect them in anyway you want. I tried that yesterday morning before work. I came home from work and tried it again and again and again using a wide variety of marking tools in B&W and in color. As Nimmer coached me on the page, I did find it freeing. It was freeing in the same way it is when I deposit leftover paint on a page in my art journal, without thinking about a subject. Like the yellow and deep dark blue green abstract painting I post and you reposted that had similarities to one of your works of art. It is there in me. I just have to trust it.
Nimmer quotes Kandinsky in his book "Creating abstract art: Ideas and inspiration for passionate art making" who said after seeing one of his paintings turned on its side and attempting to recreate the abstraction in a new painting and 'failing', "I knew then precisely that objects were harming my painting." Nimmer writes that Kandinsky stood up (figuratively I'm guessing) and, instead of facing outward from himself, turned and looked into himself." That struck a cord and I knew I was not approaching my most recent paintings with passion and from within myself.
So, Helga, thanks for shaking me out of ... What? Dullness? Whatever. I feel awake now.
Eileen
P.S. I really like your photo collage with the black bag slung around the light cloth. It is so intimate with the manikin looking out from behind the vail of thin fabric. Thank you for making the comparison to my strong colored abstract painting.
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