Redtree Times

Sometimes you find yourself out little bits of advice to other people, never realizing the irony behind the act.  Take yesterday’s post, where I passed on some advice from Chuck Close about getting to work and not waiting for inspiration.  Well, after reading what I had read yesterday morning, I looked across the studio at a large canvas that I had prepared last year, knowing that the time to take Close’s words to heart was at hand.

The canvas is 4 1/2′ by 7′  and has been haunting me for almost a year.  I had written about this canvas in a post last March called Daunting and I guess it must have been just that because I have found excuse after excuse to not start working on it over the past 10 or so months.  Too busy doing other things and the sort.  But in reality I was just plain scared of facing such a large challenge.

But thinking about Close and his words as well as his work and the challenges he has faced in his life made me feel a bit embarassed.  You shouldn’t run away from big challenges.  You should embrace them as an opportunity to simply overcome in a bigger way. I know that and have passed on that advice to others over the years.  Yet, here I was, not heeding my own words.  This was a challenge and to put it off only created other problems of avoidance.

So, I finally put it on the easel and started at it. 

It was difficult to start but it slowly is beginning to take form.  It will be a long process, much longer than I am accustomed to in my work, and I know that this will a challenge.  I will have to fight my urge to shorten the process, to take shortcuts that might not be too noticeable to the outside observer but would nag at me in the aftermath of completion. 

But the battle has been engaged and I am on the way to whatever this canvas holds for me.  We shall see…