In their own time

 "Where do you get your ideas for paintings?"

This is a question that often gets asked when we have visitors to Birdsong Studios. 

The truth is that I have a digital repository of visual ideas. These include pictures that I've taken, like the recent photo that inspired the painting of Miles Canyon, or pictures that others have taken, like the painting I finished this morning that was an interpretation of a photo taken by Cheryl West, a childhood friend from back home in Saskatchewan.

Images sit in that folder until they get their turn on the easel. It's impossible for me to predict when their time will come, only that the possibility exists. There are literally thousands of images in this folder and many will never make it to canvas. They are thought starters, inspiration boosters. 

When I'm painting for me, I don't have any problem knowing when a painting is finished. 

"A painting in never finished, only abandoned." This is a great quote attributed to Leonardo da Vinci. A lot of artists have abandonment issues and fall into the trap of overworking paintings. Generally speaking, I don't have this issue, although I've fallen into the overworking spiral of death and handful of times.