Pastels. Wonderful. Soft. Vibrant. Subtle. Amazing to touch. Exciting to paint with. Forgiving of my experiments and mistakes.
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I first discovered pastels (and sanded paper!) about ten years ago and have been thrilled to work with them since that time. Prior to that, I worked with acrylics, oils, watercolors, pen and ink, pencils, gouache, scratchboard, airbrushing, and just about every medium there is for the creation of 2D art. But none of them captured my heart – or my spirit – like pastels. |
With pastels, there is very little clean-up (you can walk away for an hour or a day with no ill effects to your work), the colors are intense, you can layer and create a large variety of great effects… and in many ways, it is a “back to the basics” medium – it seems like you are drawing and painting at the same time, the pastels are very tactile, and you connect directly with the medium and the paper. I just wish I had discovered them many years ago.
| The Pastel Society of America was only founded in 1972 and our local Austin Pastel Society was formed in 1998. But pastels have been around for a long time – according to some sources, they were first mentioned by Leonardo da Vinci in 1495. More people are becoming aware of the beauty and archival qualities of pastel paintings, and more artists are becoming interested in creating with them. Pastels are not chalk – they are made of the same pigment used in oil paints – pure powdered pigment with a binder used to keep their shape. |  |
It’s exciting that pastels are becoming more popular, and that more people are discovering their many good possibilities. Here are some interesting articles about the history, general knowledge and description of pastels ~
Wikipedia – Pastel Information
Art Show – Pastel painting resources
About.com’s information on different pastel brands
If you’re thinking of trying pastels, let me know and I can try to help you find some inexpensive materials and ways to get started! Michaels and Hobby Lobby, if you have those stores in your area, usually carry the Art Spectrum sanded paper in single sheets (which you can cut in half) or a fairly affordable packet of sheets, and there is a student grade set of pastels – Alpha Color – that they usually carry and these will give you a variety of colors to see how you like working with them. Just keep in mind that if you stick with pastels (yes, a pun) then you will eventually buy some hard pastels like NuPastels to start your painting with, some medium range pastels such as Rembrandt for much of the main work, and some exquisitely soft pastels for the finishing touches, like Sennelier or Unison. Once you’re hooked, it’s hard to find a pastel you don’t like.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Jo Castillo // Feb 22, 2009 at 11:06 pm
Regina, thanks for this great article. Appreciate the info.
2 Regina // Feb 23, 2009 at 8:03 pm
Thank you, Jo – you always have good advice on pastels and painting in general – and I appreciate it!!
3 Paul.J. // Mar 14, 2009 at 2:16 pm
“Hi Regina”. I read with interest your page on pastels. Like yourself I work in all mediums including airbrush. I found your site by a weekly download to my email address on airbrush artists. Im self taught in art and over the years have progressed in my study work in Cornish Historical Art Reconstruction work . When I’m not doing commission work or producing my own material, I often like to work in pastel, I like the feel of my touch on the paper that I work on, almost an extension of myself, and I use watercolour paper about 250gsm weight as I find it has enough natural ingress in the paper to hold the medium, I also find pastel a very creative medium to work with, and often allow the colour and pigment to do it’s own thing just allow it to happen. Im going to bookmark your page and hope to read about your adventures with art in the future.
Paul.J. Cornwall. Great Britain.
4 Regina // Mar 23, 2009 at 9:56 pm
Paul – I know very little about the art or “people of the horn”, but will see what I can discover.
I was very impressed with your drawings and paintings – http://tinyurl.com/c39qlv
I like the variety of drawing also, and wish I had discovered pastels before ten years ago. Thank you for your comments!
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