I wasn’t happy with these….
I sometimes wish I could say that a painting begins with a clear idea of where it's going.
That I know which colours I'll use, where the marks will fall, and how everything will come together in the end.
But that wouldn't be entirely truthful.
More often, there's a starting point — a remembered landscape, a particular arrangement of shapes, perhaps a colour combination that has stayed with me. I might have a vague sense of what I want to explore, but rarely a complete picture of how I'll get there.
And then the painting begins.
In the studio, this means trying things out. A wash of watercolour, a line of ink, a piece of paper added to the surface. Sometimes something works immediately. More often, it leads somewhere I hadn't anticipated.
There are moments when I know a painting needs something more, although I'm not quite sure what. I might add another layer, scrape something back, or put the work aside for a while. Occasionally, I make a mark that I immediately regret. Sometimes, that same mark turns out to be the thing that brings the whole painting together.
I've come to accept that uncertainty is part of the process.
I don't want to control every part of a painting. I'm interested in the places where materials meet and behave in unexpected ways, where a little unpredictability gives the work its character. Too much planning can leave a painting feeling overworked, and I know when I've reached the point where I need to stop.
Knowing when to stop is perhaps one of the harder things to learn.
Not every experiment becomes a finished piece. Some paintings sit in the studio for weeks before I know what to do with them. Others never quite find their way. But even those have something to offer. They might lead me towards a different colour, a new way of working, or simply help me understand what I don't want to do next time.
I think that's one of the things I value about working in the studio. It's a place where I can try something without knowing exactly how it will turn out.
The finished painting might suggest a particular place or feeling, but beneath the surface there's a whole series of decisions, changes of direction and happy accidents that you may never see.
And perhaps that's as it should be. The painting has to become its own thing eventually, separate from all the thinking and making that brought it into being.
For now, though, there's always another piece of paper waiting, another idea to test, and another beginning.
Leave them for another day…