Where do I go from here?

Painting is a strange beast , frustrating and rewarding in equal measure, for every joy you have at evolving and getting more satisfied with the work you produce there is an equal amount of despair at pictures gone wrong, and the dreaded effects that creative block produces.

I've been going though a strange period in my creative output recently, experiencing periods of elatation and confidence in my work mixed with certain periods of feeling burnt out and experiencing creative block. It is probably to do with the fact that I paint on such a regular basis now, it kind of saps the energy out of me at a certain point.

I feel my work is evolving , certainly in terms of composition, colour and complexity my work is getting better, but I do still knock into these walls of blockage and extreme self doubt as to the direction and the quality of my work. The self doubt part may be down to the fact that I paint in an abstract manner in most of my work, and that requires a kind of constant self-reinvention so that I don't repeat myself over and over again, and so that I can forge my own style.

That is my major concern at the minute, forging my own vision as opposed to something derivitive of other artists. Of course to a degree it will be derivitive, I should imagine it obvious to anyone with a knowledge of art history that I am taking inspiration from several sources - Kandinsky, Picasso, Pollock, Gorky etc etc , but the real challenge is to work though those influences, learn from them and create something new from a type of art some decree as already dead.

So where do I go from here?? God knows, but in a way thats how I like it.....

Newest painting - Triple Charged (Acrylic on 28 by 36 inch canvas)