When Paintings Find a Home

  Thank you Amy from Chicago, for the purchase of two pastel paintings.
   It is heartwarming when someone sees one of my paintings and immediately feels a connection to what they see. Happiness occurs! This makes me feel as happy as the other person does, whether or not they buy the painting.

   It's one pleasure to work through the challenges of creating a painting and it's another pleasure to share a painting and experience the spontaneous pleasure that almost jumps out of the air between the viewer and the painting when the viewer first sees it. It is as if all other artwork fades from their awareness; as they step back or walk away that one image stays with them and the person keeps going back to it. Sometimes it is as if the painting was waiting for those eyes to recognize it. I believe it's true that a painting is not finished until other people see it. When someone falls in love with a painting, in some very real way, they do fall in love. That makes everyone nearby feel good.

   It's also interesting that what I'm attached to of my work is not necessarily what someone else even notices. A painting, like a story, forms through someone's feelings and actions, then goes out into the world and finds its place. For the paintings as well as the people who create these things, one's place has to do with relationships. These two little paintings have found a place in the world, and are now 'finished'.

   My photography skills show their limits here; the camera wasn't quite catching the details or correct colors, but it's another part of painting to learn about.