To Rip or Not to Rip

I get a lot of comments when I rip out something I don't like. Tonya has told me she is amazed at the amount of time I spend re-doing some things.

I'm surprised that it causes so much consternation. If it doesn't look good, it comes out, pure and simple. Which begs the question, I suppose, how do I decide it doesn't look good?

To explain this, I need to go back a little bit.

When I was in Art School, I'd be working on a drawing or painting, and I remember my professors would ask me, "What are you trying to say?" The question used to drive me crazy. I didn't have any idea what I was trying to say. I was just trying to draw or paint what was in front of me. It took me a long time before I knew what I was "trying to say" in a piece of artwork.

Now I know. When I was drawing professionally, I always knew what project I'd be working on next, but I never started a new piece until I knew in my head "what I wanted to say." So what does that mean? It means that although I don't necessarily have a complete concept in mind when I start (unlike, say, working from a pattern, where everything is determined ahead of time), I have a good idea of what I want the end result to look like. I have an image in my head. Sometimes I've drawn a basic plan.Free-piecing, by definition, is a lot like working without a net. It's make-it-up as you go, damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead. So there are bound to be missteps. Since there is no predetermined plan, I don't know how if something is going to work until I do it. This also means the idea I had in my head at the beginning is never what I end up with. It grows, and changes. But since a quilt is not always like a painting (in that I can simply overpaint a "bad" area) I often have to "work around" what I've already done. And the idea in my head has to change too. Sometimes, what I've got isn't "bad," but a new idea is simply better.When I am working, I look for elements that are balanced. I don't want areas to be too dark (or bright), or too visually "heavy." (Or "empty.") The goal of any artwork is to capture your attention, and to move your eye around inside the edges of the piece. If your eye stops and stays in one area, that's bad. If your eye slides right over the piece, and moves away, that's bad too (meaning: boring). So it's a constant balancing act, made all the more difficult by not being exactingly pre-planned.

My goal is for the entire piece to work together. I want the individual components to make the whole greater than the sum of its parts. It's no different from making any other type of art.

One final note. There's "wonky", which is wonderful, fresh and vibrant; and then there's "sloppy workmanship, " which is completely unacceptable. If I sew something up (like the first two "hand" attempts, and it just looks terrible, and I know I can do a better job, then it comes out. Because everybody who looks at the piece will judge me by my work.Even if I'm the only one who'll ever see it.