Disappointment and Satisfaction

Well, the problem I've been having all along with the clouds in Narmada continued yesterday, so I gave up in disgust and started vacuuming and cleaning up the kitchen. I don't know why I can't get clouds to look the way I want them to. It's been a lifelong problem. I've seen people who can knock them out with a few well-placed brushstrokes. I end up laboring over them and they never look real to me.

Narmada Winery, work in progress, © 2017

After a couple of hours I went back to the America series, mostly because the recent work on those little paintings has been successful. I decided to redo the Mehri panel; she just looks lost in that space, so I'll start afresh on a new panel and paint over the old one with an oil ground. Otherwise, it's just going to bug me every single time I look at it. Better to bite the bullet now than to agonize over it forever.

Meanwhile, I focused on getting the face right on Veronica— she had been looking a bit too much like The Joker in the Batman movies, but the more I put into it, the better it looked:

Veronica, © 2017, (America series) work in progress (click on image for larger view)

And after that I was encouraged enough to do the line work for Caitlyn, who is wearing a colorful dress (in contrast to so many of the greys and somber colors of some of the others) and will be a pleasure to work on:

 Caitlyn, © 2017, (America series) work in progress (click on image for larger view)