Red Onion, Amber Jar

Red Onion, Amber Jar
7 x 5, oil on gessoed bristol

This little painting started out as a real challenge. In fact, half way through I was sure I was going to have to throw it away. The jar looked opaque and not at all transparent, the light reflections looked like smeared fingerprints. The onion wasn't making any visual sense at all. But it's just gessoed bristol, I'm telling myself, no great cost if I throw it away, just keep painting to see what you can do. And then something happened, I'm not sure exactly what, but the jar started to resolve itself. Transparent - yea! highlights looking -- real -- double yea! But that onion...I have a bad habit that whenever I feel that a painting is just boring I pick up the palette knife, load it up with lots of color, and then just go for it. Sometimes...it's like frosting a cake and just adds to my misery, but sometimes it's the perfect ending to a nice little painting. Anyway, I like it a whole lot more than I did half way through painting it.