I was asked a great question this week. Underneath one of my Youtube videos, Kathleen wrote:

"I totally understand following your intuition. I'm happiest just exploring and playing with shapes, colors and Anything that I like. But here's the one issue I have. While "playing" I forget about composition. The finished piece has to be pleasant to look at even if I don't plan on selling it. How do you balance your enthusiasm for following your intuition with the necessity of composition. Or, as an artist, does the composition come naturally to you without much cognitive thought?"

There's so much to unpack here, but I'd like to start with the last line ("as an artist, does the composition come naturally to you without much cognitive thought?"). I think this captures an idea many of us start out with - I used to believe that all professional artists had some special gift that made them able to create easily and naturally with no problems. They didn't have to think - their work just flowed out of them.

Now I know that just isn't true. Some of us find some things easier than others of course - I find colour comes naturally whereas composition is more of a struggle. And it really IS a struggle. By the time I have finished a painting, I usually feel like I have wrestled it to the ground; I'm beaten and bloodied and sure there must be an easier way!

I think my best paintings are a perfect blend of intuition and thought. When I veer too much in one direction, they go off the rails.

Too intuitive and they feel meaningless and unstructured. Too much thought and they feel laboured and lifeless.

So to answer Kathleen's question, I have found that things work best when I switch between the two states. I paint intuitively, choosing the colours and marks and shapes that feel good in the moment. I try to keep my mind out of things while I am working.

Then I step back and assess the situation. Do I have an effective composition? If not, what needs to happen to make it work?

Are the colours working? If not, what needs to change?

Most importantly, I am always asking "does this feel how I want it to feel?" I cannot navigate myself if I don't have a destination in mind.

That doesn't mean I know how the painting will look - but it means I know what I want to communicate. Sometimes I know that from the start, but mostly the idea comes to me as I play with materials. I may have been working on a series of paintings for a few weeks or months before the idea clarifies ("oh I see what this is about!").

I can't rush this part - I have to trust my intuition. I have to trust that it knows the way. My intuition is so much more intelligent than my thinking mind. But I know that if I just keep working, my mind will eventually catch up. The realisation will dawn and I will then have a much clearer sense of how to create the work.

I have realised that my current paintings are all about the mundane details and dramas of human experience. They're about my life history but they're also about the context for that history. They're about the experiences we all share, they're about how my life is really no different from anyone else's. They're about how we all go through the same things and about how those griefs and loves and losses and joys are all wiped out when we die - I suppose they're a way of putting things in context.

But I can't say all that in one painting, so each painting will be one sentence in the overall story. One might be about something joyful. One might be about something sad. One might be about anger or loss or boredom or confusion. They might describe moments in time or they might just express emotions. I don't know yet - those individual paintings will show me the way as I go. And once they speak up and tell me what they are about, I will know how to make those decisions about colour and composition.

I will ask myself "does that composition feel too balanced for a painting about that particular loss?" or "are those the right colours and marks to express the pure joy of that long ago moment?" Then I will make the changes and step back again, asking "does that work now?"

Sometimes the answer is yes, often it is no. So I just keep going until I feel that yes.

So I think for me it comes down to:

a) experimenting with materials intuitively until I understand what I am doing and why
b) working intuitively with that idea in mind
c) stepping back to assess how things look
d) switching back and forth between the two, until I feel the painting is done.

As I said, beaten and bloodied!