Chapter 3: Painting from "An Artist's Thought Book"

                                                                 # 54

A failed painting doesn’t mean you should quit, but you should be more radical.           

Most of the time when I have finished a painting and been dissatisfied with it, it is really because I did not take enough chances with the painting.  In each work there has to be some kind of challenge for both the artist and the viewer. This might mean choosing an unusual color or color scheme for ordinary objects or in some other way destabilizing the viewer’s reception of the piece. One of the small, but mighty, rewards of being an artist is when one sees a patron cruising past art in order to “see the show” and suddenly the patron comes to halt in front of your piece.  To elicit that response, one is going to have to take chances.