Stuck in the Weeds The Painting That Taught Me to Keep Going

This one was a challenge. Honestly I nearly got caught in the weeds. Actually I did get caught in the weeds. Let me tell you about one of my latest paintings titled Bonnie and Her Fall. I started out without much of a plan and that's not how I usually work but sometimes you gotta break your own rules. It was a refreshing change and yeah it was tough. Now here I'm working over an old canvas. I like to recycle sometimes. It was a pretty good stretcher. The landscape didn't have legs but now this painting does. There were moments in this project that I kind of lost the thread. Where I lost sight of where it was going but sometimes that's part of it isn't it? The unknown and the discoveries that you can make along the way. So grab a seat. I'm so glad you're here in the studio with me. I was out at the Crawford Farm which isn't too far from where I live in Lawrence in the South Island of New Zealand. A friend told me that Bonnie had just given birth to this beautiful fawn and asked if I wanted to come out and get some pictures. So of course I jumped right on it. Now I had dozens of shots to choose from but I kept coming back to this one. Now it wasn't quite a full story. It was just a start. Now oftentimes when I'm working on these projects I've got great references to work with in the studio but painting I feel takes more than that. It's not just about copying a photo. It's about pulling something deeper out of it. As an artist you've got to craft a narrative. So what's the story here? I loved the pose. The way Bonnie stood. That subtle spring morning light. Those background trees. But I wanted more. It couldn't just be a pony nicely posed. That's not enough. It can't just be an object on a field front and center. It's got to go a little bit deeper right? So I decided to push it further and I ended up coming up with something in this painting that ended up striking the right note for me. But of course you can let me know in those comments down below what you think. Now at this point I was working with a lot of transparent colors. Transparent red oxide. Ultramarine blue. A bit of transparent yellow oxide. Some phthalo green permanent crimson. Just establishing that underpainting. Working nice and thin. This initial stage is pretty immediate. I'm able to get a good idea about where the composition is going. And I'm just throwing stuff at the wall at this point. Trying to figure out what's going to work and what's not going to work. I decide to plant some trees in my composition and bring them a lot further forward. So that it's like Bonnie has just stepped into this little garden. A grove of fruit trees. And here she's just discovered a little bit of fresh hay that's been laid out for her in a weedy patch. That's right. We're gonna junk up this farmer's field with a bunch of weeds. Now why on earth would I do something so inconsiderate? Well because they're awesome to paint. That's why. Now you might be wondering what are these curious shapes just below Bonnie? Well I thought this painting actually needed a couple of smaller shapes. Maybe some chickens in the farm yard. Hey why not? The thing is the chooks weren't part of the original reference at all. They weren't part of what I saw out there on the farm. I made them up. But it's kind of plausible. I mean you would expect to see chickens in a farm yard right? But I really wanted to add something more. To build the story. To give the scene a little bit of extra life. And from a technical standpoint these were going to give me something really interesting. Pops of high contrast. A way to draw the eye and to break things up compositionally. It's those small choices that can shift a painting from something expected to something richer. Something that hopefully keeps the viewer looking. I build a rich surface of textured paint. Layering it up as I go. I like to keep those highlights pretty thick. The shadows thin. That balance is what gives the painting depth and hopefully a sense of light and form. Now Liquin helps me a lot here. It lets me layer and build up that texture quickly. Being an alkyd resin I'm insured a surface dry the very next day. If I'm using about one part medium to three parts paint. Now I'll switch between bristle brushes and synthetics just to keep that surface dynamic and interesting. But my general rule of thumb is keep those highlights thick. So you use bristles for those highlights. And then in the darker areas keep it nice and thin by using a synthetic. One of the real challenges is getting that sheen on the horse's coat. It's a one thing that I found is I like to layer the paint and brush it in in the direction that the horse's hair is growing. It's a subtle thing but it makes all the difference. And look sometimes I know the pose or the anatomy might be slightly off in these early stages but I don't let that stop me. I just keep slinging that paint. There's always time to correct things in later layers. But right now it's about composition. It's about building the bones of the painting. Now if you've seen any of my videos before you'll know I generally work in three major phases. Block in, modeling, and the detail. And that last one the detail phase that can take so many passes to really nail it. It's through these phases that I can start to render and realize a true three-dimensional form. And that's what I love about painting. It's sharing an illusion with your viewer. It's making something flat feel alive. Oh and by the way this is the very method that I teach on my academy. If you want to check that out click that link in the description down below. You can see the full version of this tutorial. It comes in four parts so click that link get yourself a free seven-day trial. Okay let's get back to work. There's something about the bond between mother and child that's really been resonating with me lately. Since having a son I found myself looking at that connection in a new way. Watching him with his mother. Seeing that instinctive trust. That closeness. It's something powerful. It's something ancient. Something universal that I think we can all relate to in a way. And it's been finding its way slowly but surely into my work. This painting for me was about that connection between Bonnie and her fault. But also exploring that something that's a little more universal. It's not just about horses here. It's about that bond that we will know. And in some form or another the need to belong. To feel safe. To be nurtured. I've always admired how the old masters handled this kind of thing. They didn't shy away from it. They leaned in. Explored it. They found layers in it. One artist that I keep coming back to is Lucy Kemp Welch. Her work has this tenderness. This strength. I'm particularly drawn to her painting In the Orchard. I even did a master copy of it at one point. Just to get a feel for how she told stories through form, light, gesture, and how she laid down that paint. You know, she captured animals, of course. But she also captured relationships. And that's what I'm after too. It's an elusive thing. Maybe I'll pull it off in this painting. Again, you tell me in those comments. And then there's the work of Alfred Munnings. What a force. His sense of movement, light, the natural world. It's been a huge inspiration for me. His paintings of horses and cows and rural scenes are just breathtaking. And his paintings have a real life to them. An energy that you can feel. But with Bonnie Interfold, I wanted to do something of my own. Something that didn't just borrow from the past, but spoke about where I am now. As an artist. As a father. As someone who's still just figuring things out. Now, I know some people might look at this kind of subject and think, all right, it's a pony with its kid. We've seen it before. Maybe it's a bit sentimental. Maybe it's been done. But honestly, I couldn't care less. Because for me, this is real. This subject, it's something that feels right. It feels honest. And I think when you start to find something like that, something that speaks to you on that level, you've got to go with it. Trust it. Follow it. There's more here than what's on the surface. More than just a pretty scene. It's about connection. About the ties that hold us, guide us, shape us. And maybe that sounds a bit lofty, but hey, if you can't get a little poetic about horses and family, what can you get poetic about? But don't worry, I'm not about to start wearing a beret and quoting philosophy in the studio. This is just me, chasing what feels true with a brush in one hand and a cup of cold coffee in the other. You know, when I started this painting, I didn't realize just how much it was going to take out of me or give back to me. Honestly, it was fits and starts working in the studio. And of late, it's been kind of frustrating with the lack of painting time. But I'm glad I hung in there with this piece. There's always a point, somewhere in the middle, where it stops being just about finishing it, and it starts being about something more. You get kind of invested. Not just in the outcome, but what it's asking of you. This wasn't just a painting to me anymore. It became something that I had to figure out. A bit of a puzzle. Something I had to see through. Something I had to solve, no matter how rough it got. And that's where the real value came in. Not in how good it looked at the end, but in what it taught me along the way. Some paintings are like that, you know? Now, a lot of my paintings go through that awkward teenager phase. It just kind of happens. I've become accustomed to it in my process. But you know that one where everything's a bit gangly, a little bit off balance, it's not quite working, you've put in all this effort, and there's something about it that still just niggles at you. It just looks wrong. And for me, this is where this painting kind of hit hard. I had these big ideas. The story that I wanted to tell, the bond between Bonnie and her fall, the light, the energy of that spring morning. But somewhere along the way, it felt like this painting just wasn't listening. It just wasn't playing with it. The colors seemed a little bit awkward. The forms were kind of fighting with each other. I particularly struggled with some contrast in the background. And again, this might be the result of having just a little bit of a plan where I shot from the hip. But I'm glad I stayed the course, because I think we ended up working it out. But I remember thinking, maybe I've just pushed this a little bit too far. And I was tempted, like I am with a few words, to just walk away. Call it a study, or an experiment. Maybe, worst case scenario, chalk it up as a loss. But I don't often do that. But here's what I've come to understand. Sometimes getting stuck can be a good thing. Sometimes it's a necessary part of it. You don't get the good stuff without wading through the muck first. That's what I found, oftentimes. That's where the real learning seems to happen. That's where your instinct gets tested, and sharpened. So I stayed. I kept showing up with this painting. And I'm kind of glad I did. There were moments here in this surface that I really enjoyed. Day after day, just working through it. Not chasing perfection, but looking for small ones. A little bit of contrast here, a little bit of a better edge there. Better color blending. Slowly, slowly, it started to turn. And that's the thing. I didn't necessarily rescue the painting, but I think this painting project had a thing to teach me. And if nothing else, it reminded me why sticking with something, even when it's hard, it matters. Now there was something else that happened in this painting that I was reminded of. And that's the zone. Hitting that zone, that flow state. We all love the idea of the zone, don't we? That magical place where time just vanishes, it disappears, and everything just flows. The paint lands perfectly. The decisions, they just feel effortless. You blink, and hours have passed. And I live for those moments, but they don't come for free. With this piece, the zone just felt out of reach for a while. I'd get a glimpse of it, just enough to keep me going, and then it would slip away again. But what I realized was, is the zone isn't just something you wait for, it's something that you earn. It's like training a muscle. Gotta keep showing up, putting in the work, even when it's flat, even when it's frustrating, especially then. But slowly, the zone starts to trust you back. It shows up more often. It stays a little longer. There were moments in the thick of the painting where I found it again. Maybe it was when I finally nailed the contrast between Bonnie, the front of her face, and that chicken in the background. Or just where those background trees started to sit just right. And in those moments, it felt like everything else just dropped away, and it was just me, the brush, the story that I was trying to tell. But even when the zone left, I kept going. Because now I know, it's the act of painting itself, the showing up, that gets you there. Not luck. Not something magical. A burst of inspiration. Just turning up. Again. And again. And again. By the end of this painting, something had shifted in me. I don't mean just in the piece, though. Yeah, I think it came together in a way that, now that I look at it, I'm proud of it. I mean, I'm kind of proud that I stayed with it. That I saw this through. You see, I started this thinking that it was just going to be another painting. A nice scene. A challenge. And sure, maybe something that I could handle, but I didn't expect it to make me rethink how I work. Or why I paint in the first place. But as I worked through it, fighting the weeds, chasing the zone, wrestling with doubt, I realized something. It's not about getting it perfect. It's about getting it honest. This painting became a reflection of where I was, right then, as an artist, and as a person. It reminded me that that process, with all its mess and frustration, this is where the real value is. And I won't lie, there were plenty of moments where I thought I'd lost it. Completely lost the thread. That I'd gone too far, but not far enough. It just wasn't working. But I kept at it. And by the time I stepped back, I saw something that felt real to me. That connection between Bonnie and her fall wasn't just about them anymore. It was kind of about me. About the bond that I see every day between my own son and his mother. About love. About patience. About trust. And yeah, maybe that sounds a bit heavy. Maybe that sounds a bit corny and cheesy for a painting of horses. But genuinely, that's what it gave me. Now, I'm not going to start writing poetry and selling crystals in the studio. I'm still me. I'm still dropping brushes. I'm still talking to myself while I paint. I still sing very badly while I'm working away in the studio. I'm still wondering if I've got any idea what I'm doing half the time. Maybe that's a point. We don't have to have it all figured out. Just have to keep going. So if there's one thing that you got from this video and my drivel, I hope it's just that. Keep slinging that paint. Thanks for joining me. I'll see you in the next video.