This painting needs something, but I can't decide if it should be a dramatic wave, rocks, distant headland...

So I thought I'd post it here to get suggestions.

Or maybe something that I haven't thought of..

I might adjust the sky colors a bit too...

Paintings like this often can stand alone.

You might try on another paper, a border of some kind. Not too busy. And see if that strikes you positively. Just do one side, and use faint colors if you use color. If you mat this instead a ruled ink border of one or more thicknesses of lines may work.

For adding stuff to drawings and paintings I always use tracing paper over the almost finished work, to try things. You have to be careful at this stage, and not get trite or corny. (if anything a few sea birds in the distance suggested, may be enough.)

Unframed paintings can look like they don't have "their clothes on"... a mat with a thin border like the museums do, often finalizes things. Often for acrylic or oil, they only use a linen liner and that minimal texture is enough.

The two worst moments in a pictures life:
1) the blank canvas at the beginning
2) the last touches or not

When pictures have minimal content, whatever the content is, should become the design device. In your siggie, the beach zags into the picture and provides that movement. In your finished new piece, clouds can do that for you and or the waves. Our eyes move around a flat 2 dimensional surface and learning how that works often then gives you a foundation for when a piece is finished. Also in your siggie the left movement created by the distant mountains to the right, is checked and the right hand darker mountains, bring the eye back to the center by being darker and shorter. So in effect the viewer's eye remains in the picture and settles on the receeding horizon of the beach. That photo is a good example of keeping the eye inside the picture. An unsettled composition, might lead the eye off the plane and out...and unless that is a desired dramatic effect, should be avoided in many instances.

One learns this in design class. Since you are doing this yourself, check out some art design places. I used a book long ago by Rudolf Arnheim....The Art of Visual Perception. At the time there was very little out there...today there must be newer easier type books.
Amazon is a good resource:
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Visual-Per.../dp/0520026136
And try the net in general. I was mostly self taught, but I did attend art school on the College level when hubby was in Vietnam after my professional training was done. I was behind the kids who had alot of art training in high school and at home. So I used some books to point me and minimize the failures that are so rampant in producing art.
(this really helped me with photographs too!)

I think in this painting, your use of color has become the main object.
So adding something might change that considerably.

This book looks interesting and may be less pithy than Arnheim:

http://www.amazon.com/Vision-Art-Mar...p_ob_b_title_1

A kayak .. or a very small fishing boat maybe..
nothing big should be small to show how we feel when we look at the ocean... small and insignificant .. BUT I LO0VE IT JUST AS IT IS
because when someone looks at it ...the imaginations each of us have puts a boat there or a whale .. thats just my opinion .
Awesome work Jo
PEACE
BMW

If it is the improvement of the painting as fine art you are asking about, you are right to feel it needs something. The image lacks a center of interest. The center of interest is usually the area where the viewer's eye tends to look naturally, or is drawn to by the composition. The center of interest is very often the most detailed or focused area of a painting, and is also where you will find the lightest lights and darkest darks, as well as the greatest contrasts.

However, placing your center of interest does not mean centering it. There is a rule of thirds that says the better compositions tend to have the center of interest placed at the cross points of a grid of nine like this:
Here is a discussion of composiiton in photography where the image came from; the same rules apply in painting: http://blog.syracuse.com/photographe...mposition.html

One more suggestion for your next painting (unless you are willing to do some creative cropping of this one) is to avoid placing the horizon line in the center of the paper. It tends to divide the paper into two halves which can easily become dis-unified. An off-center horizon tends to lead the eye and placing an object to focus on becomes much easier. And always make sure your horizon is level on a painting of the ocean . . . unless you are depicting a rough sea and a nearly capsizing boat!

By the way, you have done an excellent job of painting the water's edge and the sand . . . and, except that I know it would not be simple task, I would expand the area of sand and take the actual ocean down to a smaller fraction of the canvas.

Here are a couple of illustrations of what I am talking about (pardon my poor computer painting skills, but I think you will get the idea):

Attached Thumbnails

     

Thanks for the thoughts,

I have it out on the easel in my office so i walk past it often during the day - I 'm hoping it will "speak' to me one of these days....
I'm on the fence with adding anything or leaving as it is..I know I don't want it to be too busy.

Adding too many additional objects might risk busy-ness . . . but I would think the painting could be much better if you added a center of interest.

Tonight I am attending an artist's reception for a show in which 6 out of the 7 works I submitted were accepted. I show a dozen or more works every year at various juried fine art shows. I have juried one show myself, and a few years back I sat in on the jury while they made their decisions at a show I chaired. I know what jurors look for when selecting works to hang and to award places to. It is basically the same thing others look for when purchasing, viewing, or just enjoying art. It is also the same list artists might use when evaluating their own artwork while it is in progress, and when selecting works to hang in shows:
While it is more common that an artist will overwork a piece, it is just as dangerous to stop before you have created your best work. And so what if you change it and don't like it? If you learn from the experience, then you are doing exactly what most artists do . . . learning from each painting what could be better . . . and taking that to the easel with each fresh new canvas.

Dear Jo

it is nice... but i agree with wanting to add a touch of something...

the first thing i thought of was sun - wouldn't have to be the orb, but changing the light. this can be combined with the valid observations on center of interest:

you mentioned "adjusting the sky colors a little"

i think that if you did exactly that, creating a little more contrast, it would jazz it up quite a bit without altering content significantly, or causing busyness. do it so as to provide a focal point within the clouds as well as a sort of visual movement towards that point, it would create a center of interest, without actually inserting an object, like rocks, or a boat, or the sun itself, all of which i think would distract from the existing softness... and quite possibly detract from the piece.

the other thing i thought right off is rather subjective. i personally find the centermost and "furthest" portion of the sea a little flat... no need for big waves, but i think a little more texture there would do nicely.

good work. it is pretty even as it is. when i used to paint i was often very hesitant to go adding or reworking after a certain point... destroyed a couple of things that way. imho, art is above all an emotional channel... and if this painting feels a little empty to you, perhaps that is what you were expressing when you did it?

~ waves ~

Well, Jo, only you can decide because it is your "vision".

If your piece is small, I'd not do anything.

If larger, it might accommodate a small modification.

I use a technique called "fresh eyes" and I think you are doing this already. Look at it once a day or so. Too much and you then get familiar with it (some people call this "falling in love" with the image). Once you are cathected to it, decisions become more difficult. Sometimes a time of not looking at the work, and then re-experiencing it, will provide an answer.

In general, smaller works can be left alone, when you use intense color. The color therefore carries the piece. But for larger works, over 16x20... other design devices sometimes are needed.

Color is very emotional, so when you use it as you do, beware of inserting "intellectual" content. I've noticed your other pieces were like this too. So using color as the design elements might be the best way to go.

If I were going to do anything with a piece like this, I'd just change the clouds a little to reduce the repetition. Clouds in nature do not have common identical repetitions. Maybe tiny birds in the far distance because those would be natural. But in the end it is your decision on what to do. You chose this format because of something inside YOU, so go with that.

It's 11 x 14 so smallish.

I think after looking in the outside daylight - one thing is the mauve/Lavender/rosy streaks are too much, as well as the yellows - I got carried away and it's too vivid and the color/effect is not right.

the top clouds are too similar and need more variation of shape & color tones

the horizon is to vivid/strong it should be softened to show more distance effect & it does slope down just a bit on the right

the middle water I left fairly plain in case I decided to add a wave as a focal point - but I haven't done too many focus waves at all yet so I'm reading up on those.

I always add my birds last LOL

this really helps to pin down the adjustments for me

Please excuse the newsprint showing on this one, but I scanned it from a newspaper.

I am not very artistic, but could see a similarity between your painting and this photo, and wondered if an outcrop like the one here might break up your horizon, as well as providing a point of focus for the eye.

See what you think.