Last summer I went through some paintings from the 90's and with the help of my granddaughter, I made decisions about which to keep and which to destroy. That went along very well, until one morning I woke up and realized with a sinking feeling that I had thrown out a painting that I really liked. "Throwing out" means cutting it up into small pieces and putting it out into the garbage.
My friend Bob has told me not to do this. Although I thought enough time had gone by for me to be able to clearly sort the wheat from the chaff, it is obvious that I couldn't. Lately I have been looking through some even earlier records from the 80's, and I can see that I often threw out paintings that I wish I hadn't.
Reading in The Art Newspaper about the famous artist Gerhard Richter, I see that he has thrown out numerous paintings during his career - but only after they have been photographed. "Sometimes, when I see one of the photos, I think to myself: 'That's too bad; you could have let this one or that one survive'," Richter is quoted as saying, but added: "Cutting up the paintings was always an act of liberation."
I don't even have good photos of the ones I destroyed. But some of them did need to go.
Notes from My Studio - Pat Service
