Milken Falls

I am experiencing state-of-the-art trepidation regarding the painting of Milken Falls.  You see, I'm not one for a lot of preliminary sketches.  I like to just jump into the thing; let it evolve; feel the painting take form as if sprung from the head of Zeus.

Most of the time this works just fine.  Although I suppose your agreement with this depends a lot on your opinion of my painting.   The downside, however, is that there's frequently a lot of backtracking; a lot of painting over.  By the time I'm done, the canvas is under more layers of paint than ancient Pompeii.  Except Pompeii wasn't covered with paint.

And for most of my paintings all those layers are part of what makes them fun.

The problem here is that I've busted my ass to cover the Milken Falls scroll with newspaper and I'm worried that there will be no newspaper to see when I'm done.  Because, you see, I don't have any idea what the thing is going to look like.  And the whole idea of these newspaper paintings is that you see some of the newspaper.  Obviously.

And if I cover the thing with paint while exploring my inner waterfall muse, the newspaper thing will become moot.  Obviously.

Of course, there's this ...

A detail of my painting of Paul Ryan.  This whole newspaper business started when I needed some ambiguous white for the guy's cheek or chin -- I don't remember which -- and I ripped a piece of newspaper up and just shmooed it in there.

That might be his ear, actually.  But anyway, that, dear reader, is how this whole thing began.  So I suppose I can insert more newspaper after the fact.  Or, more accurately, during the fact.  But that feels like the loser's way out.

Getting back to the not-sure-what-to-do business: sure, there's this ...

Which one might consider a sketch of a sort; a road map to painting Milken Falls.  But the problems here are manifold.  Most notably, it sucks.

So there's gonna be a lot of thrashing about with the paint.  And this has me concerned.  I may finish with the newspaper (I'm still not done) and just hang the goddam thing on the wall for a while.

And as if that wasn't enough, I'm listening to that Icelandic band Sigur Ros.  And they're only adding to my depression.  The name of the album is Agaetis Byrjun, and I don't recommend it.  Certainly not as easy listening for the borderline suicidal.