June 22, 2022 — False alarm, I tweaked the painting! That said, I’m still calling Solstice Palm (it’s possible official name), completed as of the solstice. I thought that it was extra cool that a painting about the sun coincided with this planetary holiday. But after sleeping on it, I decided to make a change. 

So, false alarm, I tweaked the painting. I’ll show you the two paintings side by side and you can see what I did. Basically I simplified the upper sky by scraping the wet paint off the arabesques and repainting these areas in sky colors. Kind of crazy, it wasn’t till 5PM that I got to the studio, so it was really a last chance decision before I’m leaving for 3 days starting tomorrow. I was busy all day putting out a newsletter (yes! please sign up) and getting admin done. Then, while adding the painting to my inventory sheet, I saw it afresh and made the final decision to head over while I had the chance. I was back in my car running errands by 5:45PM. The change came together like magic. 

I contemplated changing it yesterday, but these can be tough calls. I liked how it was. But I think I made the right call and this is an improvement. Basically, I have a tall painting with two distinct subjects, the sunset below and the palm tree above, so you don’t want to pull the viewer too far in either direction. And honestly, the sunset SHOULD hold the day. But with those upper arabesques, it hardly had a chance.

FYI, the sun is a lot whiter and hotter in real life than on these photos. It’s pretty far from the studio lights way down there, so it’s darkened. But I think once the image capture is back, it will stand out enough. I actually wish it was bigger (the sun), but that part of the painting is too dry to scrape and rework at this point.