The Cursed Canvas
- Amy Howell
- Jun 23
- 1 min read
Occasionally, I come across a painting I can’t relate to anymore.
Sometimes I can barely look at it. I feel almost embarrassed, as if it belongs to another version of myself — one I no longer understand. Other times, I can still see something in it. Not the painting it is, but the painting it could become. A new direction appears, and I follow it, not always knowing where it will take me.
Sometimes I paint over it completely and start fresh.
And then there are those canvases that seem almost cursed.
The second version is not quite right. The third version is still not quite right. You would think I would give up, put it away, let it rest.
But no.
I become obsessed.
I must fix this. I must fix it now.
There is something deeply unsettling about an unresolved painting. It lingers. It pulls at me, quietly demanding attention, asking for something I haven’t yet discovered. I feel certain there is a solution — a way through — even if I can’t see it yet.
It becomes a kind of compulsion. I scrape, layer, cover, reveal, destroy, rebuild. The canvas turns into a conversation — sometimes even a confrontation — between what is there and what I’m trying to uncover.
And then, somewhere in that chaos, something shifts.
A color falls into place. A shape suddenly makes sense. A hidden layer resurfaces with new life. What resisted me begins to open.
And then — yes.
There it is.
That unexpected moment when everything aligns.
Relief. Joy. A quiet sense of triumph.
For a little while, everything feels right — at least in my world.
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