First painting of 2023

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Well, to be more precise: my first TRADITIONAL (as opposed to digital) painting of 2023.

©2023, Emma Pittson, “Red”. Oil on canvas, 10″ x 8″ x 0.5″.

And to be perfectly honest, this one was a real wake-up call. I realized – too late! – that I’d become too reliant on digital painting. Sure, digital painting is an art form in itself and requires its own skill set, but at the end of the day, it is not Real Paint. Real paint comes in only a set amount of colours. Real paint doesn’t have an “Undo” button. And like it or not, most people want to see an actual thing that exists out there in the world, a unique, one-of-a-kind object that has the mark of the artist’s hands all over it (metaphorically speaking).

Or maybe they don’t really care and it’s just my own insecurities talking. I have a lot of those. When I’m feeling up for it, I can ramble on about my doubts about water-miscible oils vs. REAL oil paints, and then we can watch the fur REALLY fly!

Anyways, I felt compelled to put some paint to canvas, and let me assure you that diving back into traditional art-making was a painful experience. My first painting was larger with a full selection of colours, but it had to be temporarily set aside because I realized that I had bitten off more than I could chew. This smaller, monochromatic self-portrait is actually my “rebound” painting. Still, whenever I lost control of my brush, I did, in fact, automatically move my hand in the general direction of the “Undo” button like I was still sitting in front of my keyboard (busted!).

I will say this about WMOs: just because you can mix them with water doesn’t necessarily mean that you should. Looking at this painting now, it’s obvious that I treat oil paints like glorified acrylics, and the results and not always the best. In fact, if I compare this painting to a much earlier acrylic piece (below, left), I think that the acrylic is far more successful in that the brush strokes are smoother and more confident. My signature, I’m happy to say, remains as blockish as ever. 😉

Some Nude Studies

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I’m in a transition period with my art. The goal is to set aside the self-portraits and move on to something else, but for the moment, that “something else” is only half-formed in my mind.

In the meantime, I did these figure studies because getting back to the basics is always helpful.

2022: Year in Review

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Self-portrait of Emma Pittson
©2022, Emma Pittson, "September 23 Paintover"

First, some numbers…

Number of posts this year: 21

Number of completed artworks: 19

Number of digital pieces: 17

Number of traditional pieces: 2

Number of incomplete artworks and/or tests: 5 (and no, I’m not sharing them)

Number of exhibits (virtual): 2

Number of exhibits (IRL): 0

Number of publications: 4

And now for some highlights…

Biggest, happiest Art Win this year: Being featured in the inaugural issue of “Women United Art Magazine”! To be honest, I am still pinching myself.

Most popular piece on Instagram: This fanart for “The English”. It doesn’t matter how old I am – I cannot get the urge to make fanart wholly out of my system, it seems.

Most popular piece on Instagram that ISN’T Fanart: This wip reel for “Stripes”. And for the record, I HATE reels, but it’s the only way to get eyeballs on Instagram these days.

My favourite piece: This digital portrait of my daughter…

©2022, Emma Pittson “Screentime”. Rebelle 5.

The most difficult piece to complete: This other portrait of my daughter…

©2022, Emma Pittson, “Backlit”. Rebelle 5.

My most successful piece (well, successful to me, anyways): My “Self-Portrait With Kerchief”. In my opinion, it’s one of the only pieces that looks like actual “art”, and not just a well-developed study.

©2022, Emma Pittson, “Self-Portrait with Kerchief”. Photoshop.

Piece that made more of a splash than I anticipated: My “Vintage Cleveland” piece – my second attempt at painting a colour portrait from a black & white vintage photograph. In fact, it was picked up and shared by “Photo Trouvee” magazine, which was kinda nice.

©2022, Emma Pittson, “Vintage Cleveland”. Photoshop.

Piece that went nowhere and, frankly, that fact disappoints me: To be honest, I wish that everything that I’d published this year had met with greater enthusiasm, but clearly, I don’t know how to play Instagram’s game.

Putting it all in perspective…

Ok, so… some highs, but also some lows.

My goal for 2022 was to produce a large volume of work so that I could finally break out of my eternal “studies syndrome” and make actual ART. And for a while, it was working. I think I cranked out about 5 pieces in January alone – 4 that I completed, and one that I abandoned (which was fine as it was more of a stylistic exercise anyways).

I also took the plunge and applied to have my work included in art publications and online exhibitions. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? Still, no one was more shocked than I was that the very first publication I applied to actually accepted my digital painting.

After that, there was no stopping me! Sure, I had my fair share of rejections, but overall, it was a pretty successful year in terms of having my art selected for magazines and exhibits. In particular, the team at “Women United” art magazine really believed in me – more than I believed in myself, to be honest – and to see not just one, but several, of my artworks in print is the most incredible feeling.

But here’s the thing: for someone who was supposed to spend the year in creative experimentation and risk-taking, it feels like I missed that mark by a pretty wide margin. There’s no denying it: my portfolio is very safe and very tame. Even more disappointing is the fact that I had really hoped to be able to detect some connecting threads between the pieces and to be able to say “A-ha! I can see that I should drop so-and-so and concentrate on such-and-such instead…!”. But… I haven’t hit that eureka! moment yet.

Still, considering where I was at the end of 2021, I can acknowledge that I have made enormous progress, not least because I committed to increasing my output. I also took risks by putting my work out there even though I didn’t feel like it – or I – was ready. If anything, that is what I want to take with me into 2023: “Jump, and the net will appear”.

On that self-congratulatory note, I wish everyone a fabulous Holiday Season, and I’ll see you again in 2023! 🙂

Screentime

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©2022, Emma Pittson, “Screentime”. Rebelle 5.

I’m just as guilty as the next person of spending too much of my time staring at a device, and also allowing my kids to do the same. I would also admit that I may have let things get out of hand over the last two years, but I can’t blame everything on the pandemic, can I? Long gone are the days when I would purchase a few Saturday newspapers and then spend the rest of the week-end reading them at a leisurely pace. Nowadays, all of my news comes out of a little glowing box that fits neatly in my purse. The upside is that I also get all kinds of art instruction out of said glowing box, and if it hadn’t been for that, I might never have learned about the “Rebelle” digital painting software. I used it to paint this piece of my daughter indulging in one of her favourite pastimes, which is “screentime” (naturally).

With a little help from my friends

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©2022, Emma Pittson “Summer Study” Photoshop

The first few months of 2022 were spent pushing myself to produce as much art as possible, and then the summer came… and I needed to take a break. And well-deserved, I thought!

But I admit that I’ve also been feeling the pressure from my empty easel a lot more lately, and I knew it was time to get back in the saddle. Summer was long-gone, after all! And if I don’t keep up the art-making on a daily basis, I’m prone to letting self-doubt creep in and knock me right off my stride.

Don’t get me wrong: I was over-the-moon happy to have my work featured in a magazine (#artgoals!!), but as a result, I was also hit with a MASSIVE case of Imposter Syndrome, too. Even now, I still can’t believe that my paintings are sitting alongside the work of REAL ARTISTS – women who have a body of work, gallery representation, a full bio of exhibitions, etc, etc. All I can think of is: “I’ll betcha that being an artist is their full-time job! How can I possibly think of myself as being worthy to stand amongst them??”

Well, if “working takes away anxiety”, then I knew what I had to do: get back to work!

AND it was around that time that an old high-school friend generously offered me some recent pictures of her so that I could paint someone other than myself. Talk about excellent timing! Of course, this is still digital, so in a sense, it’s a bit of a “cheat”, but I didn’t think I could handle the pressure of paints and mediums after such a lengthy absence. All in good time, all in good time…