Pastel Practice

I have never worked in pastel before, so I decided to give it a try. I chose to work with Rembrandt Soft Pastels, which are the most expensive pastels that I could afford. My palette consists of a warm and cool version of Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Violet, as well as some earth tones, Caput Mortuum, Yellow Ochre, Raw Sienna, Burnt Sienna plus Black and White.

Because pastels do not mixed until they are blended or layered on the paper, I had to buy a few tones of each color to make sure I could produce a range of values. The costs quickly added up.

I feel that many of my drawings and paintings lack movement and gesture. Since pastel seems to be a very loose, expressive medium, I hope this will help bring life into some of my drawings.

In order to get a feel for pastel, I am working on a series of simple objects. I did three apple studies trying to isolate different pastel marks.

An apple made using Vertical strokes only

An apple made by blending with my finger

An apple made using cross hatching only

Self Portrait study

This weekend I spent my time completing a self portrait for the Student Exhibit. The last self portrait I had done using (acrylic paint) was about a year and a half ago. The improvement I have seen come out of this portrait makes me feel great. Here below I have the steps taken throughout the painting. (Oil on Masonite) (8x10)

1. Image one is the finished block-in/wipe out. Looking back at this step I wish I had spent a little more time focusing on structure, due to the struggle I had in the next steps.

2. The second image was the focus on color, value/light. I felt I did a good job nailing the background, hair and clothing, but the face still needed to be changed.

3. The third image was done with detail work in mind. This was Issue number Uno. I discovered later on that I rushed into detail way to soon, (relaying on my block-in) after a crit by Mike Manley and Dave Golas. A lot of structure was incorrect, and with a little more Patience and better observation, this would not have taken as long.

4. The fourth image is a strong improvement of structure. I soaked in the advice of Mike Manley and grabbed my biggest brush, pre mixed my paints, and dived in there big shapes to repair the facial features.

5. Image five is the final results of the painting. Due to my deadline and drying time, I had to call it quits. Overall I am very impressed with the results and amount of improvement on my part.

oil painting on panel, using mediums, deadlines

Sometimes writing can be a cathartic act. I hope that's what this will be for me today. Ok so, I guess I'll start with the good news. Awhile back, a friend and I were discussing how success hinges on your willingness to make the attempt. For instance, submitting to a show in the first place. The self portrait from my last post which I submitted to the exhibition at the Plastic Club won first place in that show. It was a welcome surprise and proof that our theory holds weight. As a result I have been taking the time to look around at local opportunities and the truth is I could stay overwhelmingly and blissfully busy without any trouble. I have glorious lists of contests, exhibitions and other opportunities to provide solid, tangible goals for my paintings that will ultimately provide the initial steps to becoming financially successful as an artist. Sounds lofty, doesn't it? It isn't that I don't believe it, I do. It's just that you have to actually do it to make it real. I missed two deadlines this week. One on Friday and the other tomorrow. They were my deadlines, I am still very much on top of my schoolwork. So in way, I only disappointed one very critical person in this whole equation. Me. I am pretty disappointed in myself and there is no cure for that other than to pick myself up and start working again. Like painting, this life is going to be very much about trial and error.

So, let's talk turkey shall we? I missed the first deadline because I refused to face an old nemesis. Writing. I have always had trouble sitting down to write. It's just that part that's hard. I don't fear a white canvas but a blank piece of paper...anyway, I procrastinated on the essay until I had sufficiently sabotaged the whole venture. It was childish and ridiculous.I know the cure for that one and I am slightly acquainted with it. It's called self-discipline.

The other deadline was a painting. Now I worked on this. In fact, I lost quite a bit of sleep working on this. Lemme show you:


Look at them! I know they're ugly but, let's face the truth here. I took these just after I reluctantly admitted this was not going to be ready in time and I was entirely unhappy with it. So I was beginning to scrape the paint off. I wish I had taken a pic prior to the scraping. I was working on panel again. With the self-portrait, I was totally enamored with the smooth surface of the painting. I could lay the paint on and seemed to latch onto the surface quite well after the initial coat. This time it went on fluid and stayed that way even after subsequent layers. The only thing I did different was that I used my medium earlier in the process. In fact I used it to seal my drawing and underpainting. I believe that I effectively destroyed the absorbency of the panel. I didn't realize it during the self-portrait but, that was the characteristic that made that made that painting work so well for me. Maybe learning how important that is to me was worth all of this trouble. I only know of one solution to the problem with my current panel though. I need to sand back down and rebuild it.

Still, I am left conflicted about tomorrow. I should be dropping off a submission for a show. The problem is that I don't have anything I'm excited about entering now. I'm open for suggestions.

Life Painting

For one of my Life Painting classes, the teacher set up a model stand in the center of the cast hall. However, for the first class there would be no model. My teacher encouraged us to think about the space (Foreground, Middle ground and Background) and how to compose it.


For the next class, we had to incorporate a model into our started paintings. This exercise was great because, I had to consider the background elements of the painting before focusing on the model.

Zoo Competition

Last semester, PAFA and the Philadelphia Zoo held a school wide competition. The challenge was to create a 2D work of art highlighting an endangered species. The competitors were given a list of endangered animals, a month long pass to the Philadelphia zoo, and the opportunity to create.

I, of course, chose the African Lion (I have a fascination with lion imagery).
I decided to draw on scratchboard, which is a medium that I had never worked in before. To prepare, I did tons of online research, checked out a lot of library books, and bought many practice scratchboards.

I went to the zoo a few times to sketch and take photographs. After observing the lions, I had to decide what aspect about them I wanted to capture. Did I want to portray the strong, aggressive, predatory lion? Or did I want to show the wise, noble lion?

Of course, there is a high sense of drama and excitement when a lion is in action. However, I decided to show the lion at rest in the jungle with the light shimmering through the foliage.

After determining the basic layout of my drawing, I created a quick sketch.

Next, I made a refined drawing and a tonal study

Then it was time to get scratching. I transfered my drawing onto the scratchboard using transparent paper and white pastel.

My Scratching Supplies:

Ampersand Scratchboard 16X20
Ampersand Black Ink (for Re-inking)
Ampersand Scratchboard Tool Set: Steel Wool, Fine Point and Curved line tool, Stainless Steel wire brush, a Parallel Line tool
Xacto Knife

I started with the lion’s eyes, hoping to capture within them a spark of life and intelligence. In order to create visual interest I paid special attention to the different textures in the drawing.

Controlling the organization of the lights and darks was tricky. Due to the nature of the scratchboard, it is hard to hide mistakes. Some of my values did not separate as much as they should have, so there are some areas of visual confusion.

Even though I did not win the competition, it was an incredibly valuable experience. I was forced to go through the entire process of art making, from conception to final product. In the end, I was proud of what I had accomplished and had learned an entirely new medium.

Final version of my self-portrait in oil, charcoal portrait and figure sketches and an anatomy study of the foot.

This is a pastel drawing on regular dwg paper for Scott Noel's class. I would not recommend using that kind of paper...you can see how lovely it turned out. I learned that I change my drawing strategies with the medium automatically. That's not always a good thing and I need to be conscious of the changes I am making. Originally the figure was smaller and more isolated in the page. Scott pointed out that there are much more dramatic ways to use that rectangle and I will certainly try to do that in the future. The time to do this is while capturing the gesture. A gesture line is the condensation and organization of a whole lot of information...whew. The idea is to tack on just one more utility.



This is anatomy study I did last Saturday. I think I will keep working on specific problem areas like heads hands and feet.












This is study for the 15 week painting. I gotta admit I freezing up on how I want to use this....









So this is the final version of the self-portrait. I was extremely happy with how this turned out even though my professor thought it was too tight. The pictures don't do it justice. I worked this out on a smooth panel. I had been having lots of problems with those panels but, it worked out great for this project. The first session proves to be very hard to control and very greasy. That worked out great for the pickout I posted previously. The subsequent sessions grabbed onto the first layer rather nicely. Even though I did this over multiple sessions there is no glazing which is something I hope to employ on the next project. I have submitted this to a show at the Plastic Club on Camac St. in Philadelphia.

New Semester

Hello everyone, I hope your semesters are going as well as mine are. This post contains some early work that took place within the first and 2nd week of the semester. This was a one session study done on my own time in the cast hall. I am very pleased with how it turned out. I have never painted a cast before and I thought it would be a nice challenge.
I may be going back into this painting to polish things up a bit.
(oil on pre primed cotton canvas)

This was a one session painting done in Pyform's life painting class. The objective of the assignment was to use a limited palette to distinguish the values of the still life. Over all I think it turned out pretty good. The darks could have been a bit darker in the shadows and the light shining through the doorway could have been brighter.
(Oil on pre primed cotton canvas)

I have been looking forward to this class ever since i head about it. Having John Horn for anatomy only insured the knowledge I was going to get out of this class. This is the 2nd step to sculpting the head. This image shows my pre structure before adding any facial features.
I was very happy by the end of the day with my finished results, but im looking forward to finding out what needs to be fixed next week.
( grey clay)

This was my first wipe out I have ever done using paint. I have to say the values are very limited, pushing more towards highlights. I think this is due to pulling out to much paint and in a sense "over blending" the values.
(Oil on pre primed cotton canvas)

This is my second wipe out painting done in Jill's Basic Color class. In some aspects it is much better than the first one I did. I feel I have captured a better sense of form, weight, and space.
The face is pretty sloppy, but it was not the main focus of the study.
(Oil on pre primed cotton canvas)

This drawing is of a cast using charcoal on strathmore drawing paper. the drawing was done in Connors cast drawing class, which by the way is a great class. The drawing is a huge improvement for me in learning how to handle charcoal as if it were a painting.