A Quiet Moment

Several weeks ago, my nephew's wife posted (on Facebook) a wonderful picture of her husband and little four year old Nate. Nate was happily sitting on a pier with a fishing pole in his hands. His daddy looked like he had just come home from work. Shirt sleeves rolled up, he was kneeling on the dock - probably encouraging his son to wait just a little longer.

You have to know that daddy Mark lives to fish and I have seen some amazing pictures of his catches. So here he was with the next generation, waiting for a first fish.

The moment I saw the photo I was hooked and wrote to Olivia right away to ask if I could paint it. (Painting someone else's photo is a huge no-no in my world) She quickly gave me permission and I have loved trying to capture this moment.

Being an artist  - having 'artistic license' - is such fun. I can change things around that are fixed in a photo. I moved Nate and Mark a little closer together and fiddled with the background a bit. After all, this is about relationship not about what is on the other side of the lake.

I have worked on this off and on - in between all the art league 'stuff' that has been calling me - and decided that I just needed to package it up and send it off. One big question that is always looming is "When is the painting finished?"  Yesterday I was watching a video of Albert Handell (renowned pastelist)  and his answer was, "It's finished when you get tired of working on it!" I think for me, it was finished, because I kept picking at it - time to let it go.

The Post Script on this is, that the next day, there was another photo posted of Nate with an enormous fish and equally big smile! Hooked another one . . .