My journey with Picnic is meandering. Originally, there were a lot of figures in the background. Then, deciding that was too distracting, I took out many of them. That’s when the painting stalled. Eventually, I realized that the mass of background figures is what attracted me to the subject. So I put back the painted-over figures and then added even more. There are 30 in the painting at last count.
Behind the painting on the right is a new canvas. I put the oil-based ground on it yesterday. I applied the ground with a scrapper, which makes my favorite surface.