As an artist have you ever regretted relinquishing one of your works? Almost every time that one of my creations leave my care, I have this pang of despair, that I have been left alone. It is almost as if one of my children have left the house and will never come back. At the moment I have been reading one of the works of Oscar Wilde: The Picture of Dorian Gray. In this story, there is a painting, a portrait that is done of very good looking young man. The painting is so good that it is even better than the real person, to the extent that the artist is not prepared to sell it, donate it to a museum, or relinquish his physical hold on the painting to anyone. He says that the soul of the artist has gone into the painting. I have to admit to the same emotions (not that I can paint to the extent that the painting is better than the real person), but so much effort has gone into it's creation, that selling or donating it would seem disloyal, or acting like a traitor. There are painting that I can clearly remember, where during the creation a certain amount of internal tension, a type of agony was felt. It was trance like and enjoyable. Then, seeing that painting walk out the door is kind of painful. The purchaser is totally unaware that he is walking away with a part of me, and I´m undergoing some stress.
