SQUEAK

Pastel painting of a cat that adopted us!

GOING TO THE DOGS

I have been working on a mixed media (watercolor/pastels) for a friend of mine. This is my third attempt. Getting better!

OLDER PASTELS

Boothbay Harbor
Pastel

Sorting through some of my older pieces pinned to my studio walls or laying around. Posting a few that I had ignored or forgotten about.

Colorado Ridge Line
Pastel

SVAY TENG DENIS

I enjoy pastel work so much and found an artist that makes it look so easy. Svay Teng Denis does portraits in a beautiful free style that I only wish I could do.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uvxdbdUzRk

Levi
Pastel painting
John Brisson

MIX AND MATCH

Spent the last couple of nights down in the studio with no particular direction in mind. Mostly just fooling around. Started this out with pastels and then switched to acrylics. Have no idea why!

NEW PHOTOS

I spent some time taking new photos of some of my larger pastels. They are too big for my scanner.

FOOLIN' AROUND

I was just doing a practice session with my pastels, working on faces from a photograph I found. It just kind of grew bigger and bigger. My wife's comment "what the hell is that?" sums up how it turned out.

QUIET MEADOW

This pastel is the smallest one I have ever done. I haven't been able to spend much time in the studio but wanted to feel like I was doing something. It is only 9X12 and done mostly with pastel pencils (except the sky)

WELL-ROUNDED ARTIST

Diane Cutter is an artist living in Puerto Rico that works with all of my favorite mediums. Her blog http://theitinerantartist.blogspot.com/ shows her versatility in printmaking, scratchboard drawings, pastels and watercolor works.

MARGARET EVANS

I can't remember if I had posted anything before about this wonderful artist, but her pastels are fantastic. Her Youtube clips are where I first learned about the technique of applying paint (Gouache) to parts of the paper before using the pastels. Creates very different textures and patterns.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9rbN2ooWEI

One of my attempts below.

PASSING TIME

I have spent the past few nights working with pastels while waiting for my shipment of woodblocks. I have a couple of Linoleum blanks that I could start, but nothing jumps out at me subject wise,  for them.

'I Need a New Gig'  - From a jazz painting.

SIMONE BINGMER

I have found myself working with pastels a lot over the last few months. I think part of the reason is the pace they allow you to work at. Also, I struggle with watercolors so much, never being able to correct problems I encounter. With both pastels and acrylics, I find it much easier to fix things that I am unhappy with. I was sent a link to Simone Bingmer's web site. She is a wonderful pastel artist who lives in Cologne. I've never been quite sure weather to call the pastels I do paintings or drawings. Hers are definitely paintings. They look like beautiful oil portraits.

http://www.simonebingmer.de/index_en.html

On the right is one of my attempts.

A LITTLE MORE ANNE

These watercolors and pastels are some of my favorite things from Anne's art. The two watercolors are not yet on her web site but are really great. It's her pieces like these that keep me trying to do a watercolor every once in a while.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE

Over forty years ago there was a girl in my life that I was engaged to be married to. As often happens when people are young, our lives took different paths and we drifted apart. At first I thought about her a lot, and then time dampened the memory. After thirty some years of absolutely no contact, we reconnected about ten years ago, and have remained close ever since. One of the things that I have learned about her in our new relationship is that she loves art. She also did when I first knew her but, for some reason, I wasn't aware of it. Anne lives with her husband on beautiful Lopez Island in the Pacific Northwest where she has her own studio which was part of a studio tour last Labor Day weekend. It seems funny to me that when we were younger, I thought I was the art person with my photography and painting, never paying attention to the fact that she is pretty damn good herself. She works in pastels and also paints beautiful watercolors just to annoy me, I'm sure.

http://www.annewhirledgekarp.com/

BACK TO WHAT I KNOW

The last couple of pastel pieces I have done were floral subjects. They were fun to do and , obviously, pastel colors and flowers go together. The part that doesn't fit quite as well is me! I'm just not much of floral kind of person! I decided to go back to a subject that I'm a little more comfortable with...music. I'm still really enjoying doing things with pastels because they happen so quickly. Haven't stopped the printmaking though. I have linocut and woodblock in process.

MUSIC AND ART

Two of my favorite things. My son and daughter in law are changing my grandson's bedroom and want me to paint some pictures for the wall. Liam loves music so that is the theme they would like. Over the past month I have been doing some pastel sketches to run by them.

GOOD AND BAD

I have mentioned in prior posts how I struggle when trying to use watercolors. I have read books, watched DVDs and taken online lessons with very little growth. I can paint with acylics and now pastels and end up with something I like, but watercolors frustrate me to no end. Here is the same subject, a floral, I did both with watercolors and then with pastels. For whatever reason I feel much more freedom with the pastels.

KOI AGAIN

My pastels are getting quite a workout over the past month. It's an instant gratification thing!!

I received a good printmaking information link from a nice person named Erin

http://www.youdesignit.com/resources/printmaking-glossary

TRY, TRY AGAIN

I keep using my pastels lately, I think because of the quicker gratification. My patience seems to be limited and, even though I have a number of projects in the works, the pastels are so much quicker. This is a practice study I did of my grandson (always a fun subject for me).

MORE PRACTICE

Working with pastels (thanks Anne) is letting me practice balancing colors without taking days on a painting. I can go over the top of something and see how a different hue or color looks. These scans are from pictures I took in Catalina.