Believe me! Haste makes waste...

Yesterday was the day I HAD to finish the painting for the Haiti benefit exhibit, which will be hung in the gallery a week from today. Oils do take a while to dry, so I needed to get 'er done. So, in my physically and emotionally exhausted state, I drug myself into the studio and worked on it. "Just Do It" was my mantra. But I made some bad decisions, and one of them was to finish off the whole thing with a coat of medium, which would make it dry faster and have a gloss finish. I didn't test it on the newsprint areas first. Bad move. Here is the result:



The backside of the newsprint bled through. ARRRRGH! I walked away from it, hoping that, when it dried, the back print would disappear. No such luck. So this morning I had two options: I could either try to 'fix' this one, or start all over. When I pulled at the newsprint, thinking I'd pull some of it off and paint the newspaper, more came off than I wanted. In fact, it was all quite eager and willing to come off, so I think it's a good thing I didn't sell this piece, as I don't think it would have aged well. The gesso clearly didn't attach the paper well to the canvas. Here it is now:



So, on to plan B, which will be to do a small painting all in one go today. Those usually work pretty well for me, so I am painting with crossed fingers for this one. (A real trick, I must say!) No haste, though. Taking. It. Slow. And. Easy....

(...and doing it as quickly as possibly can be done, without making hasty decisions.)
And, of course, I MUST also get back to duck-weaving.