On Mar 3, 2010, at 12:46 PM, [email protected] wrote: > But have you ever "finished" a work, and been happy with it, only to look at it much later and decide it's not so good after all?
I finish a work when there is no impetus left to continue. Usually that happens when the painting is really "finished," but occasionally it happens when I can't figure out any other way out of where it is. I have a few like that, and I leave them out leaning against a wall, and I look at them every month or three--not to try and fix them but to reexperience what I thought was good and what was so intractable that I couldn't continue. Of all my finished work, I have a higher number of pieces on the really good end of the bell curve than on the not so good end, and of course a lot in the middle that are pretty good, ones that are nice to look at again and even to get a small buzz from. I don't have that experience with others' works. When I go to a one-person show, usually it's a few really knock-out pieces, a reasonable number of appreciable ones, and the rest I am indifferent to. I hardly ever see a piece that really puts me off. I think I like a greater proportion of my own work because I made them. But it's not pride of parentship but I was there and experienced what went into them, which means in a tautological sort of way, they reflect my tastes, preferences, formal dispositions, etc. to a far greater extent than other people's works do.
