Do you keep a - heads-up pile?

[MurrayG]

Hi folks, maybe the wrong place.
I keep a pile of paintings that gets weeded out once in a while. It's basically those that "almost" made it. Kinda Max Smart, missed it by that much ..... Usually to remember a stuffup and how/why. Gotta admit sometimes its a bin file. Does anyone keep something like that and.... does it help??
I "try" to think of it as a review, but when it comes to putting a mark on paper it usually goes out the window....

 

[Enyaw]

I go through my pieces each year and weed out things that made it but should not have. Even if it’s 50%

 

[snoball]

Mine are all standing together in a vertical stack(should I say a few vertical stacks), the good, bad and ugly.

 

[ntl]

I do. Over the recent few years most of my work has been on paper, even oils. I keep most of it in a small tub under my desk. Some, I keep to remind myself of events or ways I handled a certain subject. I do go through it at times. I did a few days ago because a few of us at Art Group were talking about color wheels. One woman had one with her and was explaining it's use to her friend. I mentioned one I made about 12 years ago when I had NO idea of what a color wheel was, and told them I would take it next Mon (tomorrow) to Art Group to show them. So I pulled it out of the bin for that.
At times, I go through it for other pieces I'm willing to toss, to use for other "experiments", esp. the unused side, or, oils over watercolors, for instance.
Occasionally I'll actually even toss a sheet!
Right now, I have several sheets hanging on styrafoam sheets to go through. Some are oils, waiting to dry to be put into sheet protectors in a notebook I've been working on, some will go into that bin, a few will probably go into the recycle pile.

 

[MurrayG]

Useful to see what others do. I guess I keep 3 piles. Watercolour & two pastels. Pastels are in an "almost" and oh-crap piles. Only some paper I can reuse as the canson objects to my way of reworking. Alcohol washes sometimes work on old works but usually gets wrinkly. But I am trying to reuse where possible. I have found alcohol sometimes creates new tooth for pastels as it loosens the fibers..... I have a big board I hang some works on to "study". Abhh but time and tides....

 

[Artyczar]

I occasionally toss, but I'm big on salvaging, so I will sometimes paint over things on canvases. It's hard to toss hours of works on canvases or cradled panels for me because they are so costly and time-consuming to seal (the panels). If I can incorporate part of what's under it, I will. Work on paper is a little different, of course. If I look back and can't stang it, I will reconsider it, learn from it, and put it in a different drawer, but I don't often trash it. I have, but it's rare. My stockpile is extremely overwhelming, though. Thirty+ years of it, and only half or so is gone.

These are all two "layers" deep by the way!

 

[MurrayG]

Oh my Arty, my piles pale into insignificance to yours. But then I have only been piling for a few short years since I could restart my artistic journey. I agree though that oils are different to paper/pastels. Many of my watercolours and pen/ink drawings from Aussie days have passed into oblivion with moves, disasters and so on, and some never made it home from unscrupulous galleries.... oh well....

 

[ZenDruid]

My stockpile is extremely overwhelming, though. Thirty+ years of it, and only half or so is gone.

But you're awfully neat and orderly.

 

[Terri]

I purged several oil pastels that I deemed total crap when we moved across the country nearly 2 years ago. Stacking and packing oil pastels is its own special chore: all done on various weights of paper and they can't touch each other.
I got through it, but that experience gives a person an added ruthlessness when considering older work.

I still have lots of work that meets the criteria of "almost made it," but for various reasons I found them worth keeping. I agree that it's a good process to look at your older stuff.

 

[Artyczar]

But you're awfully neat and orderly.

Yeah, it's a bit of a curse, and people make fun of you.