Dog on the Loom... I mean Easel!

11/18/12 Neahkanie Beach approaching storm.

I tried today to get a decent picture of the painting I currently have on my easel but we have a huge storm that descended upon us this afternoon and the day has been dark gray. I couldn't get a good shot in either natural or un-natural light so I am posting a picture I took this morning of my favorite place to paint, before the storm hit.
Many of the lovely folks who read this blog know I was a weaver for about twelve years before I turned to painting on canvas rather than making canvas. The weavers will recognize the term "dog on the loom" and will probably instantly know what I am going to say next! For those who don't weave, a short explanation is as follows:
 Weaving is a very time consuming and enjoyable process, however, it sometimes happens that a weaver will warp (thread) a loom and the fabric will not turn out well. Usually it happens when said weaver has gleefully put 10 yards on her loom while envisioning the most incredible cloth that will result. I would get... um, that is, the weaver would get about a yard or two into the process and realize that the resulting cloth is either hideously ugly, full of errors, or slowly losing its shape for some mysterious reason. Sometimes all of the above. The weaver stops and there the loom sits, with this dog on it that the weaver does not want to continue weaving yet, until it comes off the loom, prevents the weaver from moving on. I think the rest of you can see where this is heading! The weaver has two choices, either continue to painfully weave the final 120,000 yards off, or cut it off and burn the remainders by the dark of the moon. However, there is actually a third choice! Decide the warp is a lost cause and start experimenting with different weaving techniques. After all, there is nothing to lose.
If you are still with me, I currently have the painting equivalent of a dog on my loom sitting on my easel at the moment. My still life is not going well. In fact, I think it is rather ugly and uninspiring! I have a few choices here that are thankfully easier to implement on a painting than on a weaving gone bad. I can put it away for a while and then come back to it with fresh eyes to see if it is worth saving. I can also paint over it and use the linen panel again for another painting, OR, I can consider the current painting a lost cause and with nothing to lose, experiment, learn, and grow.
When I was considering my options and remembering my weaving days I realized how much I really love the freedom to experiment and how much I learned from it. In weaving sometimes the result was totally unusable as a cloth but I would save the results as reference samples. So I have decided to have a bit of fun and experiment with the painting. I can either save it as a sample or eventually paint over it and reuse the canvas. A win-win!
The storm is howling around the house tonight and is supposed to get even worse tomorrow. Hurricane force winds, pounding rain, and 32 foot waves. We are prepared and snug here. Tomorrow I have 77 small 6"x8" canvases to gesso and will have some fun news to share on Wednesday.
Stay safe and warm!
-Renee