Any serious painter knows that not every painting is successful, and here is a perfect example of a painting gone bad. Careful analysis will tell me whether or not it can be saved or must be scrapped.

I can usually tell in the first half hour whether or not my composition will work. Once I'm moving ahead, I choose a color harmony that I'll use throughout the painting. This system works well in most cases, and after a while I'm feeling pretty good about the painting.

But once in a while I'm almost finished before I realize that a painting is just not good. It's an unpleasant surprise. How did I get this far along without realizing I was off track? Why didn't I see these problem on one of my stand-backs?

There are some nice reflections in the water but they don't correspond with what's in the sky. The water shape and the land shape are almost exactly the same size-boring! Instead of adding excitement, the eye follows the diagonal right out of the painting. The small bushes look like m&m's and the scale of the palms is wrong for the sawgrass. UGH.

Sometimes working through problems leads to artistic growth, other times the painting becomes so overworked that getting rid of it (yes, trash) is the better part of valor. This one's just not my best work, and I'm going to have to make some serious changes. Off to the studio!