Above you see the final painting of my boots but not necessarily the version I prefer. I found my boots in a box a few months ago. I hadn’t seen them in years. They’re so comfortable and they’re my go to boots for running errands – along with my bright red Pumas. Today is the day following my completion of this painting above and it’s the first time I compared it with the previous version which I over painted – see below.
The initial version is very colorful. The brush strokes are expressive. I hadn’t been so “correct” about everything. My brain thinks “it is messy”, I couldn’t handle it and found it a bit too chaotic. I considered this initial version “failed”. That was OK with me. All painting practice is good – just making an attempt is fine. At the point of my “failure” I thought I would try some things. I darkened the background, toned down some of the color and “corrected” shapes within the boots. I didn’t realize I was killing this more exciting painting. The past years of my brain training makes it hard to appreciate random expressive brushstrokes and bold color. I try from time to time but it’s a struggle. My training is portrait realism, though increasingly I add a bit of expression and creativity “around” a face. I tried expressiveness “on the face” once” and posted it. It’s awful!.
I like the final painting, the bluer one at the top – but I find it less exciting. This experience has been important for me and I’ll continue to attempt to push past my limitations and the discomfort I feel when things are not “correct”. It’s sad for a painter to feel that way. Correctness might be important when assessing a realistic portrait but not BOOTS! I took many photos of my boots posed differently. I’ll likely try to paint them again in a different pose.
RESISTANCE: Oh my gosh! When do we get a break!! So far the Supreme Court and other Federal courts are barely holding together the provisions of the Constitution, although it is the Supreme Court which has gotten us into this mess and Garcia is still not back. Fortunately many others immigrants have been saved from deportation without “due process”, at least for now and Trump is pissed. Significantly, Donald’s ‘Big Beautiful New Deal” also failed in committee even before it could go to the House which saves Medicaid, which provides care to “the most vulnerable amongst us” ie, food and health care to children, medical care to people with extraordinary medical conditions, and medical care for the lowest income population and Veterans care as well. We have such immoral leadership in the Republican Party with Donald’s attempt to eliminate this level of support so the richest people in the world and large corporations can have more is IMMORAL – PLAIN AND SIMPLE! The reason Donald’s “Big Beautiful Bill” which he insisted it be called – didn’t get out of committee is because of the RESISTANCE throughout the country. Republicans from some districts know their tenure would be over in 26 if they did not vote to save Medicaid. 5 Republicans on that committee voted with Democrats providing a vote of 21against the bill to 15 which closed it down. I am thankful for those 5 votes. Between the Supreme Court ruling and the defeat of this bill he wanted to pass desperately, this was not a good week for Donald. I think he’s still smiling, however, because of the prospect of a $400 million luxury plane from Qatar. We’ll see. His lack of morality has no bound but then what would one expect from a criminal. This is what criminals do. Bye for now. Winifred
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