Thursday, October 8, 2009

She's Never Satisfied

When I first paitned this in 2008 I was pleased with the contrasts of the snow and the dark woodline. The piece is 18 x 24" and all that white remains interesting because of all the color in the "white" snow. But as I looked at it every day the darks seemed too dark and I got the itch to make some changes. Last night I did.... the trees became more lighter, more mellow and thereby gave the painting a lot more depth. The interesting thing is that while I did fool with the weeds I didn't touch the foreground snow and look at it now! Granted the photo was taken with flash but the mood it totally different now. Its still on the easel; I may alter some of those pines. They are a little too symetrical for me. But for the most part its done. Again.


4 comments:

Karen said...

So interesting because when I first opened your blog I went Wow!! to the first version. I actually really liked the strength of the darks. But the changes you made totally change the mood and scene, and now it has this ethereal, soft feeling...still strong, but so different.

Nicole said...

I like both versions, but the newer one has a much more delicate mood. It's really interesting to see the two of them juxtaposed like this. The updated version looks colder because of the misty, cool colours (which is what you want in a winter picture, no?). Great work on the subtleties of the snow, too!

Autumn Leaves said...

I really like the second version! I thought the first one was a sandy beach meandering out as you approached a wooded area. (I do have quite a different way of looking at things so I expect this is a reflection of my skewed vision! LOL) I love the changes you've made though! I am reminded of heading off to get a Christmas tree as they used to do in times gone by...

Kathleen Harrington said...

Its interestig that this week Robert Genn writes about the merits of re-doing existing paintings.Usually I toss out those dogs that linger around the studio but sometimes i feel compelled to change things.
I may do another version of this with lots of darks but this one bugged me because the darks were too flat.