Solving A Painting That Is Not Working, Part 2

Solving A Painting That Is Not Working, Part 2

 I suggested several steps yesterday to take when you can't figure out why a painting isn't working. For this painting, even turning it upside down wasn't getting me to what the problem was.  So luckily for me, my family was here. Family – especially teens and young 20's will tell you the truth – even when you didn't ask them.   : )

My family was curious how I could  fix the imbalance after they noticed the problem.  Since they were interested I got them involved in step 1 – brainstorm how to fix it.   With my chalk – step 2 – I sketched out on the painted canvas our ideas. [ Chalk is great  – it doesn't disturb the painting and wipes right off. ]    We tried adding more sunflowers, more details on the pumpkins, pumpkin leaves and vines from the stems, until someone blurted out turning it into a jack- 0-lantern.  Whoa!….. that was not at all what I had been thinking. 

But you know what?  It worked. It balanced the painting and added a light note to the painting to match the color palette I had chosen.  Here's the chalked idea:

And here's the final painting after also adding a final tint on the pumpkins and photographing in natural light:

I had envisioned an Indian summer day for this painting, picking a light palette of colors rather than the usual darker colors used in pumpkin paintings. Adding a face to the pumpkin kept a lightness in the painting in addition to balancing out a composition error.  In a roundabout way, that's where the painting ended up – a warm, Indian summer day in early October.

What do you think?