Not all ideas are good ideas. Sometimes it’s best to abandon an idea if it is not the right fit. I have abandoned my fishing lure project. It was a fail. Was it a total waste of time? No, not at all. It may seem like a waste, but I’ll tell you why it wasn’t.
The project got me back into doing preparatory sketches. I was doing sketches before but it was kind of a rare occurrence, which Is a shame. I really like doing sketches. Sketching allows me to be loose and really mess around, and work out concerns without committing to anything. I also have found that sketches capture an exciting energy that isn’t in a reference photo. Because of that I like to work from both a reference and a sketch.
The project made me more aware about what I do like. When I was trying to make still life work for me, I made a list of things that I love from my previous works and tried to apply it to my still life setups (to make them more interesting). I do this a lot with other artists' work, but very rarely look at my own work in that way. Which was kind of fun. I discovered that I was doing a lot of things that I wasn’t aware of. When I look at other artists' work, I assess things that I like and then experiment with them in my own work to see how I like it. When I reflected on what I like about my work, it brought a level of excitement, because I know how much I’m going to enjoy it.
The project got me to really focus more about composition. I always think about composition, but when you are building a painting out of nothing, you focus a lot more on composition. Since my still life setups were all boring me I decided to do some good ‘ol youtube research about building interesting compositions. That took me down a rabbit hole of all sorts of videos on making more interesting paintings. It was a nice refresher about all the things that I should consider before starting a piece. It also got me thinking more about editing. After all, it's not very common that people see my source material for my projects, so why not push things a little?
The project gave my brain a break from my usual process and allowed me to think differently. Basically it gave me the space needed to miss my work. After having space and a few new insights, I was ready to create a bunch of new paintings and really dive deep into my obsession with livestock. It got me thinking about how I can better capture or recreate my experience with them. Before I knew it I had about 20 paintings in my mind ready to be made. Which is not common.
It has pushed me to be more confident in listening to my gut and making little mini series that, let’s be honest, is basically the same painting multiple times, but slightly different to show movement or the lapse of time or whatever. I don’t know if it’s because I love stop motion or if it’s because I’m just overly obsessed with cows and their every move, but I really like the idea of painting the same thing over and over again. It also feels like the more I paint them the more I will truly get to know them and how they move.
It was very clear that it was the right decision considering that after about a month of trying to find a composition that worked for my fishing lures, I still had nothing. Within a few days after giving up on the project, I had multiple paintings in my mind ready and waiting to come alive.
I’m loving this series so far and glad I was able to have this failed experiment with my fishing lures. Failures are always good. Without them, I would never grow my ideas and try new things.
Until next time, happy failing!