Not my best day artistically. I think I’m still running on empty from our trip. I scraped the paint off of a canvas not once but twice today. Things were just not working for me. To be honest I gave a moments thought to taking my scraped off canvas and turning it into an abstract. Unfortunately and fortunately for me I just can’t be a sellout when it comes to my work. The one and only abstract piece I’ve posted with this blog was an inspired piece, actually the only abstract piece I’ve ever created. That one was inspired by a piece of burnt copper, no matter how long and hard I looked at that scraped canvas today it gave me nothing. I finally walked away from it. I looked through my studio and found one of my old orphaned paintings. It was flat and lifeless. I threw it on the easel and began to work with the paint muck I had created with my scrapings. It had turned a very strange sort of lavender. I just went with it, I didn’t want to waste the paint. As always I was much too impatient, the “muck” began to get muddier. I had to pull myself back, wipe off my brushes and begin again. I found what worked for me eventually was to go with a more impressionistic stroke,  in the end I feel like the painting has too much paint, but on the positive side it isn’t flat! And I didn’t give up. I have to admit that today was the first time in a while that “I’m not good enough” snuck back into my brain. It all comes down to oils and my lack of patience. I keep making the same mistakes and expecting different results. I’m going to let the scraped canvas cure and attempt something with what remained on the canvas. I hope for better results the second time around.I may have had a bad artistic mojo day, but I did empty the photos from my phone. In previous blogs I have mentioned both Prairie Crossings and McDonald Woods, both north of Chicago near my Dad’s house. We had the opportunity to grab a few early morning walks before my Dad was awake last week. The McDonald Wood photos are in Dan’s  phone and I’ll have to grab them tomorrow, but for tonight a few from Prairie Crossing. A little slice of heaven on the prairie.