Create from the Heart

How to Choose the next Painting…

“If I create from the heart, nearly everything works; if from the head, almost nothing.”  Marc Chagall

The next painting keeps coming back, a recurring memory, like a dream that wants to be remembered. My Santa Fe Zen pink sky was like that. I saw such glorious skies on our recent trip, they seemed to insist to be painted. Once I had the sky, Hawk came circling over, an over, and over, for 7 days, until I got it. This Hawk was a part of the pink sky glory.

The white flowers were like that. I had taken pics of these gorgeous flowers last month at a landscape garden center. They were in with a number of others that I had already painted, but their image kept popping up on my iphoto, ipad, and even iphone. Finally I printed them out to contemplate where they belonged. It all came together yesterday….I combined the two images I had, picked a vase I love, and it became a painting! I had to see how I would approach white on white flowers. White is considered a ‘cool’ color, and the colors I found myself intuitively drawn to were a lemon yellow, cobalt, and payne’s gray, all leaning towards the cooler spectrum.

I’ve never been one to follow the ‘trend’, and even have to be talked into doing a commission. That isn’t how I work the best. I guess it’s like Marc Chagall says, ‘coming from the heart, nearly everything works’. Making things in anticipation for what will sell, works the same way. I never knew what would sell. Each piece comes from an inner dialogue that continually flows throughout the day. I may see something that triggers an idea, or read a technique that I must try. It seems to come from ‘out there’. It certainly isn’t coming from some logical thought process.

One image does lead to another. Once done, it’s time to move on. I take my recent experience, go deeper, keep learning, continually experimenting, and I find my happy place.