A Peaceful Over-Doing

 

Bryce Canyon Hoodoos
9" x 12"
Fluid Cold Press W/C paper

I set out to do an abstract painting of these hoodoos at Bryce Canyon--had even practiced with a quick 8" x 8" abstract (see below). 

But my hands had different ideas. Sometimes you just feel like slopping on a lot of paint and going into more detail and complexity even though you know you're headed into overdoing it. Maybe it was a way of trying to work out complex feelings involved with how to care from afar for an elderly mother while also wanting to be an active grandmother locally.  

There was no resolution--just a two-hour sense of peace while trying to represent rocks and trees and sky at Bryce Canyon--a remarkable sight that my husband and I took in on our way earlier this month to Iowa while en route to see my mother. 

So today, this is proof: even a painting that doesn't really work can be good for the soul. 

And maybe eventually it'll end up on my wall of landscapes that I'm framing just because they help me recollect lovely places that I've been in the last few years: Crab Cove, Alameda; Tennessee Valley Cove, Marin County; a road leading to Santa Fe; Big Sur, just south of Carmel. And yes, maybe these hoodoos of Bryce Canyon, if the painting grows on me--which does sometimes happen. 

Bryce Hoodoos, Abstract
8" x 8" 
Speedball Field Watercolor Journal