Orange

Orange, the backstory

A short attention span

I think the older I get, the shorter my attention span. In the 1990's I worked in colored pencil and it was not unusual for a painting/drawing to take 80 hours. In the 2000's I switched to pastel - a much faster medium. Now, in the 2010's (2019) I'm working more and more in oil but I if I spend more than a few hours total on a painting, it loses it's freshness and I lose interest. 

My method of working these days is to set up a still life beside my easel, take a reference photo (before the flowers shatter and the fruit rots), block in the composition with a sketch, paint for an hour or two, let it dry and then tweak it over the next few days or weeks. This suits me now.

See the progress of this painting here.

Strawberries, oil, 20 x 20 inches