Back from collecting So, How Have You Been? from Stockport. Notified that none of my four entries for the Discerning Eye were selected. Disappointed, but I know I won't be alone, that there were many entries and that there are large elements of chance in any competition. Here is Home Life, one of the entries.
For me, more emotional and detailed than the Napoleon painting which was chosen in a past year. I have slowed down substantially in painting in recent years, yet I feel more able, a better painter and more filled with new ideas than ever. This year I've painted the Ekphrastic Triptych and a commission in the 'symphonic' style, that's all. Perhaps painting holds less appeal when I have so much existent work around me.
It's odd how different and imperfect this old work looks to me. I really need to paint endlessly, overtake the old work with startling and staggeringly better work, but I need more time and space for this, and perhaps a greater incentive than to merely up the average quality of my back catalogue.
