Small Things, October 2025

In September, at the Capitol Arts Market, we had a show of small works of art.  Nothing could be larger than six by six inches.  Painting small canvases is something I really enjoy doing.  The art pieces depicted in this blog are three by three inches.  They depict scenes from my trip to Tuscany last October.

  Small works are the opposite of what you normally see in a public art gallery, where canvases can be six by six feet in dimension.  With a huge canvas, you have to stand way back to take in the whole thing.  With a small canvas, you can see the whole image from a distance but stand really close to take in the fine details. 

  Paintings that small require one to eliminate what isn’t all that important.  Finding the basic shapes in the composition is first.  I do a sketch with pencil on paper, then on the canvas, sometimes erasing and resketching several times to get it right.  Doing an underpainting with a large brush, where the whole canvas gets a coat of paint to help define the basic shapes, comes next.  Once the underpainting is dry, I add detail to the shapes.  Selecting the right colours and building contrast is important to create depth in the painting.  The final step is to use a very fine brush to add all the little details. 

  When I think about it, it is a bit like life.  We look at the big picture of what is going on around us.  We focus on what is important to us and leave out the unnecessary stuff.  Dealing with activities and obligations can be fairly simple.  Daily tasks are often routine, and we move through them without a lot of thought.  Dealing with the people in our lives can be a bit more complicated and requires more attention to detail. Sometimes the little details can be very important.  That’s where paying close attention is significant.  Creating our daily life picture is totally up to us.  Before you know it, those days become years, and you wonder where all the time went.  Make the most of the life you have, pay attention to the important details, and the rest will follow.