Decisions Are Difficult

The Season Had Changed, 48"x72"x2", acrylic, Dura-Lar on cradled panel, 2017 copyright Mary Zeran

Have you ever wondered what sort of changes a piece of art goes through before it's done?

Sometimes people think that because a painting has a minimal composition, that is was easy and quick to create. The reality is that the more  simple the composition, the longer it takes. Determining the thickness or a line or the shade of a color can take hours. It always amazes me how just shaving off a 1/2 inch can make all the difference between a successful piece and one that's just "meh".

The photos below show some of the decision making process for creating my new piece "The Season Had Changed". You can see how the pieces extended passed the cradled panel and had to be trimmed. How It took me a while to settle on the exact color of the purple rectangle and eventually ended up layering a piece of magenta woodgrain overtop to give it more depth.

There can be a lot of back and forth. For instance, should I have a blue vertical line or a yellow or maybe both. Notice the black swatches. Do you see how I must have adjusted them a million times before I settled on the final marks. Looking back at the first image, I liked the organic form on the bottom better, but by that time I'd stolen bits to add the black ball above the blue pour, and above the red and white rectangle.

It's amazing how long all this subtle tweaking can take. I keep hoping I'll get faster, but...I'm so seduced by the search for the perfect arrangement. Going through the motions is necessary to making sure I haven't left any idea unexplored.

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