After the Game

Just before I put the bleachers in, the commissioner of the painting asked to see it. He has been following me on the blog but he wanted to see it in person before I finished it. I'm glad he did for several reasons.

In many of my art classes, when I would ask if something needed changing the teacher would say, "If you have to ask, you already know". There were a couple of things in the painting that kept nagging at me, but all of my peers told me they were fine. Not surprisingly, they were exactly what the commissioner asked me to change. He was very kind and hesitant about asking me to change anything, but I told him that he was going to have to look at for a very long time and if it was going to bother him every time he looked at it, then it needed to be changed.

The only issue left is the tar pit. Black or really dark pigments tend to absorb the light and go dull. You'll notice around the legs how this is happening quite obviously. On Monday when the painting is dry I will spray a varnish over it, which will even out the pigments and take away the stark gradients in the darks.

I appreciated that he was so pleased with the piece and had enjoyed following the blog.

What will stay with me forever is how, after spending some time with the painting, he suddenly excused himself because he was getting emotional. If the painting can do that for him, then I have done was I was asked to do.

After the Game