Cat Girl

100 Day Project Day 59

I have been procrastinating about this painting for ten days. I had the substrate prepped, and the figure sketched, and now I see from scrolling back through this blog that it really is ten days.

If I had a pound for every reason and excuse – they are all excuses, c’mon – I would be able to buy myself a box of sketchbooks.

Today I decided this cannot go on any longer because it’s beyond silly, so I procrastinated all morning, and eventually got everything together ready to start… and the sun came out like an eye-piercing ball of blinding what the actual fuck.

The spot where I had my easel, and where I would be mixing paint, and where I would be trying to see was transformed into a kind of torture chamber. Then someone parked their car on the pavement opposite, and all the chrome started threatening me with a migraine. I got, shall we say, somewhat frustrated, and painted the air blue with some choice phrases.

In the end I moved my easel, which isn’t small, into my study, where the light was better, and I’m congratulating myself for not quitting.

As is always the way, once I got stuck in to the painting, I got lost in the brushstrokes, and the puzzles, and the colours. You could tattoo this onto the inside of my eyeballs, but it still wouldn’t stop me from creating great big blocks between me and some paintings.

Sometimes I think the practise isn’t about the drawing, painting, colour theory, technique or creativity, it’s just about practising to get out of my own way.

This is a Let’s Face It class painting, and it’s a child and a cat, which I never paint, and it’s in oils, and in one afternoon I got her this far, and after all the procrastination, I quite like her.

I am thinking about the way I can find my way into the zone with lots of media, but I don’t have any tricks like that for oils, so I’m going to think about that this evening.

Til the morn,

Suzanne