New Year - New Painting

This painting was started at the beginning of December, 2013 but it looks like its not going to be completed until 2014. There are still some unresolved areas. 

My paintings are signed on the day that the last brush stroke is made. The paintings are signed with scratched in initials, month and date in the lower left hand corner ( e.g. "md 1/014"  for Marian Dioguardi, January 2014). I try to make it as invisible as it can be but still be there.

The most important question for me is: "Are signatures distracting visual elements to the intended composition?" and for me they are. With all that, the fact remains that clients do like to see a signature on the front. I understand and so my almost invisible signature fills their request and it's not a distracting element to my composition. 

Signatures on paintings are a topic of discussion among students, artists, and artists and galleries. One philosophy holds that the painting itself , style, subject matter etc., should identify the painter. There should be no need for a signature on the front of a painting.  However many artists and students want it to be perfectly clear that they did the painting and this can be very wise when some paintings just look like other paintings and only a signature can distinguish them apart. However, the painted signature on the front of a painting can be very difficult to read so there should be additional identification on a painting.

The back of a painting is another story. Things happen to paintings and then people want to clearly know  who the painter was for traceability. Perhaps a piece is stolen and recovered? A piece becomes part of an estate? A piece enters into the secondary art market or best of all someone wants to know who painted it because they want to buy another. So, on the back of the painting, my name is fully written out along with date and title. The painting then it is off into the world for its own life.