Ideas for paintings pop into my head all the time. These ideas may be sparked by something I saw in the news, something I read, something I saw while walking down the street, there is no one method by which these ideas may generate.
But in my head what I think is a fully resolved composition, when I try to bring this vision into reality it becomes quickly apparent that the ideas is not quite as fleshed out as I would like it to be. This idea is nothing more than a spark of inspiration – a concept, the bones of an idea – and like bones, not much use without the flesh and muscle to hold the whole thing together. Many a time this is where resistance (or procrastination) takes over and I am left floundering, residing the idea to just another item on the ‘Ideas to paint’ list.
Each year at the start of each quarter, I like to sit down and take stock about where I am at and where I hope to be at the end of the proceeding 3 months. This quarter I have made the decision to focus more directly on developing the conceptualising and fleshing out of ideas aspect of my art as this is quite obviously an area that needs a bit more work.
This will involve looking through that ‘Ideas to paint’ list and working on a range of studies – namely compositional, value and colour studies – without worrying too much about moving on to a finished piece for any at this stage. It will also mean looking deeper at the subject itself to understand it more, rather than just on a superficial level by going with the first thing that comes into my head.
I think if I remove the thought of attempting any finished work of art away for now, I will be less inclined to skip over or rush through these developmental steps and I am interested to see what other advantages come from this. I expect with the additional time and thought, more ideas will develop from this process which could eventually turn into a series from something that started out as just and initial spark of an idea.
