Purple Funyuns

Kay Smith, an artist friend from Big Spring, came up with he name for this "folly". What was originally a pile of purple figs has turned into a pile of purple onions. What was originally a horizontal painting turned into a vertical painting the longer I kept at it. All artists have projects that just don't work for some reason or the other, and this is one for me. I loved the subject, but this just does not please me and I thought I'd share my thoughts here. Nothing an artist ever paints is a waste! Artists always learn, and as with everything in life, some of the best lessons learned are failures. In evaluating this piece, the failure is mainly in the design. I am not gifted with the ability to come up with lights and shadows to give a painting correctness and to my eyes, this is evident here. There are good lights and darks in some individual passages, but as an overall composition there is not a strong element of design and this is my main objection here. Good lesson learned...take the time to #l do a value sketch if you have questions, or #2, always work from a photograph with correct shadows and values. Kay is coming to Noonday in the Spring to conduct a workshop and she has the gift of taking failed paintings and resurrecting them. I'll defer to Kay on this one. This will be a good challenge.