Deciding what to leave out of a painting is often harder than deciding what to put in. After thirty years working as a designer, I learned that the elements you remove create the clarity, tension, and emotional impact of the final piece. I now treat the decision to leave parts unpainted as an instinct, stopping the moment the painting says what it needs to say, and trusting the empty space to do the rest.
The hardest skill I ever learned
When I worked as a designer, I spent thirty years staring at client briefs that said “make it pop” and “add more stuff.”
The natural instinct, when you are trying to prove your value, is to keep adding. More colour. More texture. More details. And almost every single time, I would look at the finished work and realise the best version of the design was the version from two hours ago, before I started overworking it.
That lesson took me a long time to learn. Over the years, I realised that every single element you add to a composition comes at a cost. It costs attention. It costs clarity. It costs the quiet, powerful simplicity that makes people actually stop and look.
So I started applying the exact same discipline to my paintings. If a brushstroke doesn’t add anything meaningful, I leave it out. If a shadow can be implied by an unpainted gap, I don’t paint it. I let the dark void do the heavy lifting.
How I know when to stop
In the Active Void technique, I work fast. I don’t overthink. I lay down the grey gesso, add the black or deep plum gesso, sketch in chalk, and start carving the subject out with white acrylic.
And then, at a certain point, I stop.
How do I know when that moment is? Honestly, it is more of a feeling than a rule. It is the moment when the subject feels alive. When the koala looks like it is actually staring back at you. When the frog looks like it is ready to blink. When the owl feels like it is perched somewhere in the dark, watching.
When I hit that moment, I put the brush down and I walk away. I don’t go back and add more shading. I don’t fix “mistakes.” I trust that the unpainted spaces I left are doing exactly what they are supposed to do.
The fear of the empty space
I will be completely honest with you. It took me a long time to trust the empty space.
Every artist has that moment of panic where you look at your painting and think, “Should I add a bit more here? The background feels too plain. Maybe I should paint a branch. Maybe I should add a leaf.”
Leaving something unpainted feels like you are forgetting something. It feels like you have unfinished business. But over the years, I have learned to listen to that feeling and treat it as a sign that I am on the right track. If the empty space makes you uncomfortable, you are doing it right.
Why the audience loves the empty space
Here is the secret that I learned from years of watching people react to art. They don’t remember the details. They remember the feeling.
If you paint every single leaf on a tree, the viewer glances, nods, and walks away. But if you paint a single stark branch against a dark void, the viewer stops. They imagine the rest of the tree. They project their own experience onto the blank space.
That is why I leave things out. Not because I am lazy. Not because I couldn’t paint the details if I tried. But because the details are not what you will remember. The quiet, empty, breathing space is what will make you come back for another look.
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A quick tip for your own creative projects
The Nightlife collection is built entirely on this philosophy — each piece is a study in knowing exactly when to stop painting and when to let the dark void take over. If you would like a closer look at the stories behind these pieces, you can download my free digital Art Book.
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If you are ready to bring a piece of that philosophy into your own space, you can browse the original acrylics and fine-art prints in the shop.
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