Landscapes of the Skin - and blessings

This is my favourite nude.

She was painted along with all those others while I was still in college. I think this drawing really encapsulates for me the theme I call "Landscapes of the Skin" I don't think the concept needs much explaining when you look at the line of 'hills and valleys silhouetted against a dark sky'.

Sometimes things just work out for you in every way which is of course terribly satisfying. I like very much the fact that the lines of her body are rhythmic and repeating. I also feel quite proud that although the lines are definitely feminine they are not too soft and have a certain angularity to them which therefore makes her a bit more interesting and edgy and not simply accommodating.

Another thing i like very much about the composition of this drawing is the fact that I have drawn a horizontal figure on a portrait format - and it works.

You know the more I look at it the more I think it would make a really good print too - nice balance of dark and light and all that.

Oh dear I am getting carried away with myself - "Self praise is no praise" as someone once said to me - probably my mother.

I have to admit to feeling quite pleased with myself at the moment though - i hope that does not sound boastful, but it is really not meant that way. I only mean that I have been working really hard and really working through an awful lot of ideas. Getting them down and painting them up and hoarding those ideas for further development. So important when there are so many times that the creative juices run completely dry and I wander round the house thinking myself such a failure. But with paintings and ideas in the bag, so to speak, i have something that I can pull out in those times of famine and tell myself that I am not such a failure after all.

And that is my sermon for the day - When things get bad, cast your mind back to some of the successes you had in your life and remind yourself of those, rather than dwelling on the failures. Or as Pongo said to Missis (or was it the other way round) in 'The Hundred and One Dalmatians" or was it "The Starlight Barking" (I think there are a couple of books I need to reread!), he said "Remember to count you blessings"

So on that note i will now go for a walk, learn some Spanish and count my blessings at the same time. Now that's what i call multitasking!