The Ugly Betty Phase

I’m not sure if anyone else feels this way, but pretty much every piece of art I paint goes through what I call the “Ugly Betty” phase. For me, this is when the canvas looks absolutely nothing like what’s in my head, and quite honestly isn’t appealing AT ALL. Maybe it’s because I am a self taught artist and I need to intuitively feel may way through each composition, but my gut tells me this isn’t just something that I experience.

I decided to talk about UB because she used to make me feel frustrated and less than. I would think that I was foolish to think that I could be an artist. I’ve learned that when a painting isn’t developing, I am probably overthinking it and trying too hard. The best thing for me to do is to walk away and do something to clear my mind, like take a walk or exercise. When I do this, I find that creativity tends to “show up” and take over. Having an engineering brain, this has been an especially hard lesson for me to learn. I still manage to mess up some good work by not walking away soon enough, but not as often as I used to and I am more forgiving to myself. At some point I decided that I was going to embrace these moments and use them as opportunities to grow and learn. Frustration still joins the party at times, but even it has taught me to lean in, press on and ultimately produce work that I am proud of and didn’t know I had in me.

Ugly Betty - Ready to paint over it

Original “It’s a Lori - Ugly Betty transformed