A pear and the bitter taste of defeat

Bosc/Box, oil on panel, 7" x 7", 2010

Here's a piece I just finished. Nothing too groundbreaking as far as subject matter is concerned but I needed to knock something out to remind myself that I still knew how to paint. I just spent a month working on another, more involved piece. Sadly, it ended up not really coming together the way I wanted. So it's facing the wall to be reviewed after a couple other projects. On occasion it can help to not look at a piece for a while to rediscover its merits. When you've poured so much time and energy into a piece, it can be very easy to get disheartened when it doesn't go your way. And like any tumultuous relationship, sometimes you just need some time apart to reevaluate things. And sometimes a piece just fails. In that case, all you can do is learn what you can from the defeat and apply that knowledge to future projects.