The Grind

In general progress feels like it's been unduly slow -- just a tedious, lurching, unforgiving grind. Some days feel less oppressive than others. Starting up a new endeavor always feels like this though, if it's something that you've intended some sort of specific timeline for. I would like to be able to produce 1 to 2 paintings a month. Once rolling I should be able to knock them out, but it takes quite a bit more build up to even be able to begin. And the final wild card seems to be the learning curve. I can effectively say I'm attempting someting I've not only never done before, but I've also never practiced before to any real extent. In the last 10 years I've only completed 1 painting in oil prior to now, and that one painting amounted to a whole slew of mistakes -- a learning experience. So, hopefully at some point the curve will level off and less of my energy will have to be allocated to experimenting with my process.

This is an earlier stage of the drawing I currently have displayed in my gallery (assuming I haven't taken it down!) Plus I think this drawing is apropos of the sentiments of this particular post -- you know, a palpable sense of malaise and/or existential anguish...)