Both

SOL Tuesday 3 Minutes

I was glad when Ale walked toward me during lunch. I got up and hugged her, telling her how sorry I was for missing her exhibition at Art Basel this past week. She was kind and understanding, as always.

I asked her how everything went, and among attendance updates, she shared that she was still hoping to hear from someone interested in buying her big painting.

“Yesterday, he asked to see a photo of it during the day, so he could see it in that light,” she added. Betsy, who had joined our table as well, agreed, “That makes sense!”

I was curious about which painting he was interested in buying, so I asked her to show me a photo. She pulled out her phone, went to her Instagram profile, and tapped on her latest post.

Mesmerizing. I didn’t get to read the caption she wrote for the post in that moment.

I’m not good at understanding and expressing how I feel about art, but for her, I’ll give it a try: her choice of movement and colors makes me think of possibilities. Nothing is too bad, too lost, too much. There’s always something else out there; it’s what her art tells me.

We talked about the piece for a bit, admiring its intentional details. Then, she mentions, “Yeah, I’ve worked on that thing for 10 years.”

I giggled a bit, incredulous.

“En serio!” she responded to my shock—For real.

She went on to tell us the story of how she started painting in university, showed us an old photo, laughed as she talked about going through a phase of “nah,” and covering the entire canvas with charcoal. A black kind of statement. Not a chance to still see what was.

Her subtle mode between bites, laughs, and storytelling left me at a loss for words. I felt such admiration yet such anguish. Working on one single piece of art for that long? Going through such changes and still believing in it? Impressive.

I immediately thought of my approach to writing: don’t look at it for too long, don’t overthink it, just put it out there and move on. I don’t think I have it in me to work on a piece of writing for a full decade. How does one choose to cover it with layer upon layer of could-be‘s? How does one persevere through that? How does one know when it’s finally done?

After writing a few notes in my notes app, I told her she was going to be my Tuesday slice, and we went on to chat about other subjects while there was still some food on our plates.

Tonight, after putting Elena to bed, I sat with a glass of wine and thought of that painting and the entire story. I went on Instagram, looked her up, and admired the art once again. This time, I read her caption:

“I Didn’t Know It Then,” 2025

A painting that has lived with me for a decade, growing and changing as I have. It began as a distant vision, an energetic world lingering at the edge of my awareness, and has slowly stepped forward to become part of my everyday landscape. It’s a place governed by balance, where light and darkness coexist in a constant surge of energy, forms, and fleeting impressions.

Her words turned my perspective upside down. I thought I’d write about the foreign approach to coexisting with a project for that long. I know I don’t have that kind of patience, or perhaps I don’t have an artistic enough mindset. Ale will probably disagree with that.

This is what she just taught me: it’s okay to feed a habit by writing, posting, and moving on. It keeps me in communion with this part of me I love so much. But perhaps I need to wander off a bit and consider ideas that require a longer commitment. Ideas that have been waiting for years to come to life, changing and growing without my attention. Waiting to come up in my priority list.

Maybe I need to cover some old stories with charcoal and start over.

Maybe they need new layers of expression. Newer words I could use to pull them out of the shadows.

Maybe, instead of choosing the quick or the paced out, I can welcome both.

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Published by Ana Valentina Patton

I aim to be a learner, not a knower. If I forget, please remind me.

Published

8 thoughts on “Both”

  1. Wow, Sharon. What a story that is! Thank you for sharing it! The idea of “just doing it” and not getting caught in the depth or meaning of my writing has kept me sane all these years. When I started writing (at 19 years old), I was blessed with the effects of immaturity, ego, and ignorance. I cared very little about what my writing turned out to be and more about putting it out there. I wrote day after day for years. When I go back and read those old poems, I find a stranger. Yet, I admire her relentless hunger for writing. I wish I could turn off self-awareness whenever I feel the urge to put pen to paper.

    I’m keeping these words:

    “I know that I don’t have another 20 years to give to a book in this way,” she said.

    Liked by 1 person

  4. First, gorgeous painting! I was mesmerized by it.

    Second, I appreciate the parallels you drew between an artist’s process and the writing process. There is something to be said about a long-term ongoing project. (I don’t have any in the hopper right now, but I have been percolating something in my mind for an eternity.)

    Liked by 1 person

  6. Ana,

    I love the crosspollination between painting and writing, between your friends’ work and yours. I can feel the energy as you consider your friends’ work and how it can lead you to new possibilities.

    Your post reminded me of this article from the NYTimes about Kiran Desai working on her most recent book for twenty years.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/04/books/review/kiran-desai-the-loneliness-of-sonia-and-sunny.html

    Leading a solitary life — supported by fellowships and grants and a substantial publishing advance in 2010 — allowed Desai to spend nearly two decades of uninterrupted work on the novel. “Artistic loneliness,” she said, “can be exquisite.”

    Still, at times, she worried she might never finish the novel, and that she was exhausting her publisher’s patience.

    “I’ve been incredibly lucky to have people there who trusted that I would deliver something,” she said, “because it would have been completely fair to think otherwise.”

    She, too, had a cover everything in charcoal moment:

    About seven years into writing, Desai was at a residency in Brussels when she decided to print out the manuscript. She was shocked at what kept spilling out of the printer; she realized she had written 5,000 pages.

    “I was horrified,” she said. “I hadn’t understood what a dire situation it was.”

    She tried to untangle the web of narratives and cut ruthlessly, but the story had no center.

    An unlikely solution arrived in the mail one day, in the form of a small painting. It was sent to Desai by the artist Francesco Clemente as thanks for Desai’s foreword to his book, “Emblems of Transformation.” Desai was mesmerized by the image of a dark deity with outstretched arms and a terrifying blank face.

    The haunting figure made its way into the novel in the form of an amulet that Sonia keeps with her as a talisman that bestows creative power.

    It played a similar role for Desai, who keeps the painting next to her wherever she’s working. The image provided “a secret structure” for the book, she said. The faceless figure shows up repeatedly in the narrative, practically becoming a character in itself, and gave her a framework to explore ideas from Hindu and Buddhist philosophy about how the feeling of a fixed self is an illusion.

    “It was in front of my eyes the whole time I was working and it seeped deeply into the book,” she said.

    After working on Sonia and Sunny’s story for so many years, Desai feels a bit unmoored. She said she’s unlikely to take on a narrative of that scope again, and hopes to write something “quick and frivolous.”

    “I know that I don’t have another 20 years to give to a book in this way,” she said.

    At the same time, she feels fortunate that she could give herself over so completely to the story, even as she’s struggling to untangle herself from it now.

    “All these years, wherever I was, the book was with me, so to be without it and to not be intensely involved in the story, is unnerving,” she said. “To leave real life for artistic life felt very lucky.”

    I read another article somewhere about how she was dedicating so much time to the book, working long hours every day for twenty years, that friends and neighbors were worried about her and attempted interventions.

    I’m looking forward to reading Desai’s new novel. I’ve read her other books and they were beautiful.

    I hope you’ll keep us posted in future slices about how shifting your time frame shifts your writing:

    Maybe I need to cover some old stories with charcoal and start over.

    Maybe they need new layers of expression. Newer words I could use to pull them out of the shadows.

    Maybe, instead of choosing the quick or the paced out, I can welcome both.

    Liked by 1 person

  7. What a beautifully crafted piece, Ana, and that art is stunning. I can see ten years there, and am always in awe of authors who say their work was a decade in the making…that “nah” comments when looking at the work-in-progress. John Warner wrote a bit about the dedication writing takes just yesterday on his Substack. I am with you, quick and slow both have lessons to teach. Good to hear your voice today.

    Liked by 1 person

  8. Ahhh! What a cool slice. I looove Ale’s paintings and hope to be able to buy one for our home one day. The comparison of the writing process and the artist’s process here is fantastic. I am so impressed by her commitment. This line: “Maybe I need to cover some old stories with charcoal and start over.”
    I wish we could literally do that. That’s something quite magical about visual art.
    How can we borrow from these other art forms in writing and learn from them?
    I have a feeling you’re about to find out.

    Liked by 1 person

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