My husband loves me and is happy that I greatly enjoy working on my art. But he’s one of those folks that is most impressed by art work that looks like a photograph or even MORE than a photograph. My looser, impressionistic style makes him more than a little crazy. He said it makes him feel like he is looking at an out of focus photograph.

As someone who grew up with less than perfect eyesight… really horrible eyesight, in fact, out of focus is actually more normal for me than sharply in focus. I was blessed to get laser surgery on my eyes many years ago and I cannot even express to people what a difference that has made in my life. I still wear reading glasses for close up work, but to be able to drive without glasses, take photos without glasses and PAINT without glasses is still just amazing to me.

It also makes him confused when I take a photo and when using it as a reference, change things in the painting.

For example, in the painting above, I left out several of the logs that had fallen across into the ponded area because to me, they confused the composition. Mind you, the composition is not perfect, the one fallen tree ended up being my focal point (when it was originally supposed to be the tree with the bright orange leaves on the point). And that one fallen tree is smack dab in the center of the painting. Ideally (at least the way I was taught), it should be in line with the top or bottom third.  But what does he say when he comes to look? “It’s blurry and you are missing some of the logs.” Ah, well.

Here is the reference photo should you care to compare.