Critique

The red and black painting I posted yesterday is a dark version of a painting I did a few years ago to represent a hurricane. I think maybe I was painting the hurricane in my mind on this current 'hurricane' painting.

So, back to the painting problem. I took my two pear paintings to show my friend Audrey, portrait painter extraordinare, and she asked me what most interested me to make me want to paint the pears. I said it was the light and shadows, but mostly the shadows.

She asked me to squint at the paintings and said, "See, there's no contrast." I agreed. So I brought the paintings back home and painted Carbazole Dioxazine Violet and Alizarin Crimson on the shadows. Today, that I painted was more an accomplishment than the improvement in the paintings.