The short answer: Hours, days, weeks, months, years, and a lifetime.

The long answer: I have been painting for nearly thirty years. The first ten years of painting produced mountains of work. Paintings literally piled up in stacks throughout my house. (I worked on canvas board to save money and space.)
I was refining my craft, solidifying my technique.

As I practiced, practiced, practiced, my work and my artist’s eye evolved. I began painting in my mind’s eye. This is one of the most transcendent aspects of my process. When I paint “in my head,” there are no limits to what I can do. I am infinite. It is when I put paint on canvas that the heroine’s journey begins.
I work spontaneously to capture the infinity I have seen in my mind’s eye.
With acrylic as the medium, I must work fast before the paint dries. This constraint compels me to work with singular focus. The world falls away and paint pours out of me.

There is the percolation process. I may not put paint on canvas for an extended time. Daily I paint in my mind’s eye. I am in my studio every day, touching canvas, pulling out various colors, and meditating on my internal infinity and a blank canvas. Then, there is a knowing deep inside my bones and I must paint!
With a heavy flow of paint applied, I have a longer time to complete a work. This is especially challenging because as the paint dries, the painting morphs. Somehow I must get back to my internal vision and transform the work. For most of the day and night, I am on creative call.

Well, the truth is, rarely my work is worthy of you. I have abundant good, but not amazing, paintings. These paintings go into the “under construction” zone. I ponder them daily, bring them into critique groups, bring in art pals for opinions, dream about them, and try not to tear my hair out! This is a frustrating, lengthy, and iterative process. When I am successful, which happens too rarely, I feel complete and victorious. I often will dance around the house to honor this creative release.