Original Oil Painting “Behold, A New Beginning”

Hello Everyone,

This is a new 18” X 24” original oil painting I just completed this past weekend. Usually, it take me a little time to come up with a title for a painting.

For some reason, this one was easy.

Between the lush vegetation and those refreshing looking waters, this piece just screamed “new beginning” to me.

Originally, this composition had two waterfalls in it. As I was painting it, I just kept adding more and more places to put a waterfall.

For me, when I imagine what the world looked like when God was done creating it would be a wonderful place. Bright clean air, an abundance of water, vegetation and sunshine coupled with the unknown.

Now, I am not comparing this painting to what God did, I am just using the analogy to explain what was going through mu heart when I was painting this piece.

As you have probably seen, when I start a painting, it rarely ends up being what I initially imagined it to be. The start is always good, but then, the painting seems to take on a life force of its own and in a subtle way, paints itself. Sometimes I feel as if my only job with a particular painting is to hold the brush and lay out more paint. I seem to be the helper.

In my early days as an artist, that notion seemed ridicules to me. I never realized that a painting can somehow, in a possibly spiritual way, control its own creation. As I matured as an artist, I learned to keep my vanity out and allow my “inner artist” that force inside of me to take control. The more I let go, the more my work progressed. It is to the point now, where I look for those signs as I am painting. I try to be in tune with what my “inner artist” may or may want with this next composition and work from there.

When people ask me to explain my work flow, it is sometimes very difficult to put into words how I actually create my work. I, at times probably sound like a crazy artist from the 19th century that is an eyelash away from cutting my own ear off, but in reality, no.

I am not crazy, and the more I think about it, maybe some of those artists from a very long time ago were not crazy either. Maybe they understood the concept of the “inner artist” all to well and figured if they spoke about it, they might in fact be ostracized for it. They lived in a very unforgiving era in world history.

Maybe, just maybe, they knew what they were doing all along. Maybe, just maybe, that is the secret to beautiful art.

Have A Blessed Day My Friends