Fluid piece from past contrasts with overworked recent work

Mountain Sails - digital painting - Dan Beck circa 1998

Originally I was planning on sharing a recent digital painting - but I surprised myself by not being able to undo a mistake.  I write all the time about mistakes being mistakes only in relation to what follows - meaning - they can be ok and even a blessing if you keep working.

Well I did, but the color in the piece had gotten too muddy … and even though I worked it to a point that I liked it - when printed it just didn’t sing.

But above is a piece I did many years ago. It was quite fluid - not overworked - and as far as I am concerned quite pleasing.

My understanding of the medium was quite limited at the time, but I had learned how to overlap translucent color gradients and that was huge.

Anyway - I am offering the above piece as an example of what works … and chalking up my latest piece to not everything can be so good.

See Also

• Mountain Sails
  Full Enlargement of Above Piece
• The religion of Jackson Pollock, painter
  Capturing the concept of fluid painting beyond what I am describing