Wednesday 18 April 2007

Gnawing Doubt



Before the Run (Oil on canvas, 36 x 36 ins)

My friends from the Figure 8 painters group came round to my house yesterday and we had a meeting with the curator of a gallery in Darlington. It went very well and it looks like we have yet another promised show, possibly at the end of the year, or into the new one.

The curator had called to see some of our work, before offering us the show, and one of the pictures I brought up from the studio was this pre-Great North Run picture. I hadn't looked at it for a while and I'm having definite doubts about it now. It looks quite good reduced here on the page, but in the flesh, as it were, I can see how I might have to work on it some more. My intention with it was to stop at a newer simplicity, but now I think it may have to be brought round to something like the state of the first one I did on this subject.

4 comments:

ian gordon said...

Hmmmm, I do like the one on the link (the first one).

But let's face it, how many of us wouldn't paint practically all of our stuff again. I look through old works thinking "I like that idea; I could do it so much better now".

I think technique improves, whilst ideas seldom grow too old.

harry bell said...

Can't argue with that.

But I think the problem with the more recent Run picture is that I stopped too soon. So if I decide to go back into it, it won't be a question of repainting it, but of finishing it.

jafabrit said...

I think you have to trust your instincts. I mean I like it, in fact it is mind boggling and cool> However I can see why, when looking at your first one that you feel the need to tweak it.

harry bell said...

You're right, of course. I need to do what I feel is appropriate to my vision. When the two were hanging together in a show last year, I was definitely uneasy with the more recent one. I think I need to get tweaking.