Black to school

In March of 2021, I signed up for Heather Bullach's Spring Oil Painting workshop.

I was fresh off a generally successful but personally exhausting NaMoPaiMo. 

I kind of knew it was a bad time, but also, I really wanted to paint this horse chestnut.

The problem was, I had to prep her first. Even by old Eberl standards, she was terrible.

I tried really hard, but in the end, I could not get her there.

I ended up last minute substituting my Bill resin, mostly because he didn't need a lot of prepwork.

Unfortunately, this particular horse had a previously broken leg. I repaired it, but not as well as I should have.

It broke during the first painting session, and then because he was wet, it stayed broke.

For various reasons - partly that leg, but mostly post-NaMo burnout - I really struggled with the class. I didn't finish my horse, and I still haven't fixed that leg.

In the nearly three years since then, I have been tempted by so many of Heather's workshops. Inevitably, however, I find myself looking over at Bill and Myrtle standing on the project shelf and thinking, "Nope, don't need to do that again."

But this is the year of challenging myself and finishing things, so when I saw that Heather was doing a beginner friendly Black class during NaMoPaiMo, I decided to go for it.

I looked through my stash and found a horse that wanted to be black. Then I got her prepped, primed and base coated in record time. No problems, no drama.

Of course we all know, the drama came later.

After a long, stressful, scary day, I made it home just in time for the workshop. Even though I really was not in a good headspace, I thought about muscling through and painting along with my classmates. I also thought about skipping it all together and watching the video in the morning. Neither of those ideas were particularly appealing, so I came up with a compromise. I joined the class, but did not paint. Instead, I drank a beer, played with Piper and took notes.

The next morning, I got up, reread my notes and gave Antara her first coat of oils

I am someone who does my best work in the morning, before I'm worn down by the stresses of daily life. I think I will stick to this schedule for the next couple of classes at least.

No matter how I participate, I am really, really excited about this class. It's so nice to sit with so many people, working together on their models. Thank you, Heather, for providing us with this fantastic opportunity. I can't wait to see our giant herd of black models in the NaMoPaiMo Winners' Circle!