I saved myself from the trash bin

I have done it earlier, but why not doing it again?
There are coming in new Steemians every day, so let me introduce myself again.

Recently I found some old pictures of the making of this oil painting. Although this painting was finished in the year 2000, I started the first layers of oil paint 5 years earlier.
Sometimes during the process, a painting has to sit against the wall and catching dust for a couple of years. Waiting until I figured out why I wasn’t happy with it. There is always the danger to end up in the trash bin. But after a while, I realised the composition was not right.
The beauty of painting on wooden panel is; there is some room left to change composition. With a saw. Like you can see on the process-photo's; the painting started it’s life as a rectangle, to become a square format later on. Cutting off a third of the original size was the trick to kept me going and finish this self-portrait.

First I went out with my camera to find a gloomy industrial background. Because those days bird gloomy was the word.

Then I had to find out how my face looked when a spotlight was beaming up from a lower position.

Here you see the intentional shape of the panel. This was 1995.

This were the first outlines.

And another layer.

For the people who are trying to figuring out my age (something I'm always tending to do myself), I'm 52. And the young me is 30 yo.

Happy Steeming