Yesterday I finished painting for a show at East Stroudsburg University that is a full month away. This is unheard of for me! Anyone who knows me knows that I’m usually still painting on my way to hang a show, and that I should be putting up signs on the wall that say “Wet Paint” instead of labels with the titles.
Not this time. I have to send the work to PA next week and it has to dry first, and so I had to stop working. I really should have stopped on Sunday, but there was no way. So I pushed it to Monday and then Tuesday and finally Wednesday. Two friends came over to look at the paintings and said, “We think you have a show!” And so it is.
I’ve been on such a roller coaster ride of emotions this past month. Up and down all the time with lots of curves. Some days I felt that I wanted to cancel the whole thing or give in and show old work. Other days I was just so happy to be in my studio painting that I didn’t care if the work was good or not. Other days I cared way too much and felt inadequate to every other painter on the face of the earth. I just wanted to crawl back in bed and never touch a paintbrush again.
Did I say days? No, my feelings could change drastically in the space of five minutes. I could go from ecstatic to depressed and moody in a moment of time. From feeling totally in the flow and joyful about what was happening to totally disconnected and insecure.
The eleven paintings are a product of all those emotions, and I have to say that as of this morning, I am feeling pretty good about them. But catch me in an hour or two….
Pictured is a detail from one of them.
susanbradfordart.com 