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If You Didn't Doubt

I have been working and learning in my studio. And this 5x22" canvas of Belgian linen mounted on Ampersand Gessobord was quite the process. For the underpainting, I used Williamsburg Oils' burnt sienna and Gamblin's flake white alternative with a bit of Gamblin's cold wax medium added to the paint.
 
 
On my first pass, I just did a thin layer of color.
 
 
And I just had to show you the before and after of my palette for the second pass. They get a little messy. 🤷‍♀️ But somewhere along my second pass I got away from my original concept for the piece.
 
 
This is where taking progress pictures came in for the win. 🙌 On the third pass, I pulled up the picture of the underpainting on the TV and used it as a guide to help me bring the painting back on track. 
 
 
Then, it looked too "perfect," so I breyered the entire painting on the fourth pass and dabbed off excess paint with tissue paper.
 
 
I added paint back to the darker areas.
 
 
To give it a special touch, I added the flowers in the bottom right corner and used my palette knife to scratch in the fence wire.
 
 
Painting can sometimes be a process of one step forward and two steps back. This was definitely one of those for me, but try to creatively think through the process on how you can salvage your painting rather than having to trash them.
 
I do openly admit I have my own closet full of bad paintings, and sometimes you are mentally beyond the point of frustration to try to salvage it. Trust me, I have been there. Just know if you didn't doubt and push yourself at different points during your work, you probably wouldn't be as far along as you are today.
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