Cut the kids in half?

[erik_satie_rolls]

Here is a piece of a painting, I really like this:
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/29-Mar-2003/17539-iiia-web.jpg

Here's another piece:

http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/29-Mar-2003/17539-iii-bweb.jpg

I also like this part. But now the whole thing:

Studio III oil, 18X24 in.

http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/29-Mar-2003/17539-iii-2web.jpg

I absolutely hate what this picture is doing coloristically when I back away from it. I'm ready to cut it in pieces and sell them separately. Any advice?


Dan

[TeAnne]

I'm liking it was it is really. I could be that your background is competeing with your busy figures?

[arlene]

soften the background...especially those lights and i think you'll like it more...also put a few judicious highlights on the figures.

[timelady]

It's the yellow light up top that bothers me most. When I cover it up the colours seem quite balanced. Perhaps just change/tone down the yellow there?

Tina.

[Lahree]

I think the problems are with the horizontal bright lights at the top. If you change or remove them, it really looks fabulous!

Lori

[yoyita_yoyita]

I have covered the lights with a piece of the ceiling in the upper right, for you to see before doing any type of alteration to the work. I think it works quite nice.


Yoyita (http://www.yoyita.com)

[eezacque]

First, I agree with what's been said and done about the high lights. Second, my eyes first hit the vertical standing figure on the right and then
slide across the horizontal group in the background to slide out of the picture! The horizontals on floor and wall, with their common meeting point somewhere left from this picture, and the leftmost figure moving out, seem to add to this fast exit. Third, and most inportant, this picture creates a great atmosphere of beautiful young girls who somewhat hesitatingly dance their first steps in a somewhat dirty and not too pleasant environment.

The simplest solution is, I think, to close the obvious 'exit' by adding a 'stopper' like a shadow on the left, which makes the viewer conclude there is nothing out there and return on its steps back to the ballerinas.

The solution I'd prefer most, if not a bit impractical, is to make the picture much wider, to lead the viewer to a figure in the distant left, which balances the standing figure on the right.

[erik_satie_rolls]

Thank you for all your wonderful comments.

TeAnne, arlene, Tina, Lori, Yoyita - yes, the lights are interfering with the composition. They should be taken out.

eezacque - Your comment about the composition was right on, but the most helpful to me is the one about the brush and color work not being conducive to the subject. You've helped me get to what was a very big issue in my paintings.

Again, thank you all.

Dan

[jackiesimmonds]

Agree with every bit of advice offered, and it's great that these insights have redirected you back to your initial ideals.

Also.........have a look at the thread about negative and positive shapes, and look at one of the suggested links, which is an essay on negative shapes - the spaces around and between the subject.

What you have here is a classic example; lovely fluid figures, and, hope you won't take offence, negative spaces which do not aid the composition at all, rather, the spaces detract from the main content of the picture.

I am sure, however, that with all the help you have been given, you can sort it all out!