Just Say No.

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Yes, I know, you've seen it before.  I sat yesterday and did a bit more of the long stitching in the stop section, looked at it and thought...nope.  This isn't working.  Actually, none of it is working.  And that's for two reasons.  Firstly, the balance of the monoprint.  The intention was to have a semi-abstract landscape piece, but the blue area, to me at least, is too large, and the yellow strip down the right hand side, too narrow.  I was about to say that the original print looked better, because of the intensity of the colour, but actually...it doesn't.  It would, if the yellow strip was wider, and the whole piece, therefore, wider, because that would balance it all up.  And then there's the stitch.  I like the lower section, but the top just Isn't Doing It  for me,  and trimming off a section at the top improves things a little, but really, not enough to justify the amount of work I'd be putting into it. There really is nothing I can do,on this piece, anyway, so I'm going to stop working on it.  I'm just not able to turn a sow's ear into a silk purse. 

Once upon a time, I would have said, 'so I'll cut them both up and use them in other things'.  Know what?  Just not going to happen.  This one is going in the bin, so that it doesn't stare at me accusingly from whatever box I put it in, going, you got it badly wrong, na na na na na.  I'm not going to waste time and energy thinking about what to do with the remains; if it was that obvious, I would have worked it out.  I've tried looking at the individual elements, to see if they are workable on their own; they aren't, with the possible exception of this section of the first print.

It's arguably a bit wide, but that's okay, I can work with that.  The wool is couched, I find, not needle felted, so can be removed and repositioned, or even left as it is, with other pieces added.  There's the possibility that it still won't work....but if that's the case, it will be because I'm not convinced it sits well with who I am and what I do.  I'm not sure that I'm particularly interested in making such a direct reference to a landscape.  I got into the habit of doing that while I was selling work; it was more likely to sell than the pure abstracts I prefer to make...but of course, I don't do that any more, so it shouldn't affect my thinking. 

I think there is a general feeling, with textiles, that it's important not to waste things, and therefore not to bin them.  I'm of the view that I've got everything I can get out of these pieces of fabric, in terms of learning, and that is enough.  Given the design flaw, they're not really any use to anyone else, so there's no point in giving them away, so I'll keep that small section, bin the rest, and not waste any more time and energy on them.  And I might get a decent enough small piece out of the remains.  Bonus.  At the end of the day, though, my time and energy is far more valuable to me than a few bits of fabric.  When something isn't working, it's definitely worth taking the time to look hard at it to understand exactly why that is, regardless of which point in the creative process you are in.  Not every piece works out, and, with a blatant disregard for mixing metaphors, flogging a dead horse will not turn a sow's ear into a silk purse.  Bin it.  You know you want to...just make sure you learn something from it, first.