Behind the Art: Painting Progression
Written and Illustrated by Dave Huddleston
One of the approaches I taught in my art classes was to have students splash paint on their canvas or paper with plenty of water to form a random, abstract pattern with absolutely no subject in mind.
I told them they only had ten seconds to do this to prevent any over thinking or over working. Then take a thirty second walk around the room and come back to their work with a new perspective.
After turning the painting in all directions they would decide how it "spoke" to them and what it wanted to be. This process and the resulting finished work are shown side-by-side above.
