To overwork a painting or not, that is the question

I just found this blog post by a local artist, David Rourke, on the whole concept of "overworking" a painting. He makes some really valid points, especially how the fear of overworking impacts a new painter's progress. His advice really hit home for me because I think about that a lot and I am most definitely a new painter. One of my all time favorite artists is Lucien Freud who sometimes takes months to do a painting and there is clearly nothing overworked about his masterpieces.

As an aside, did you know that he broke the record for the highest price paid for a living artist's painting? $33,600,000.

I don't think they bought it to go with the drapes.