Matt, with an anxious gaze
 

I did this sketch of Matt, a neighbor from 26 years ago, to try out some new Unison Pastels I ordered at the PSOA Conference last week. I ordered the full set of 394 colors, and about 80% of it has arrived at my door. Perhaps I am the one who is actually anxious, wondering what I had just purchased!

These are very soft pastels in mostly very brilliant colors. I am on a learning curve. Despite all the different color options, the right color desired in my mind seems elusive, and does not manifest until several sticks are layered in application over another for a vibrating optical blend. That's when the magic begins. It seems these soft pastels can be applied in endless successive modifying layers. I have no idea how to apply these sticks of color with precision; the lack of precision seem part of the charm and effect of these soft pastels, and goes part and parcel with the cross-hatched weaving and juxtaposition of colors. Any focused resolution on eye and mouth details, are just accidents of these sticks of color landing in approximately the right place, or even the wrong place with a lot of modifying nudging corrections. It's almost like drawing with your feet!

At the PSOA Conference last week, Wendy Caporale spoke on the advantage to painters of exploring color vibrancy through pastels. Thus, my order of the full set! Frankly, I personally think it is much easier to paint in oils, but these brilliant pastels have opened up new possibilities and options in expressive color interpretation I would have overlooked in oil paint. I think she is right!

Matt posed for a handfull of slide and black and white narrative photographs in 1981, outside my parent's home, and over the decades his impish character has made an appearance in several figurative paintings, themed on the set of that front porch. Although his theme is old, I recall Matt having a kalidoscope of colors throughout his face; even some elusive cool blues and greens, in concert with his eyes. This seemed a perfect challenge to express with these new pastels.

I suppose this sketch could be retouched and modified forever, but I thought I would pause here to share this for a critique. Any thoughts on the use of and experience with soft pastels like these Unisons is welcomed too!

The support is an 80 lb. pad of 18 x 24 gray pastel paper from Borden & Riley. Any paper recommendations are welcomed as well.

Garth

Hi, congratulations on buying a full set of Unison pastels, I'm envious!
I recently struggled through a workshop having lost my pastels along with my luggage. I had to buy Windsor and Newton pastels as replacements. The difference was incredible. They were unforgiving, scratchy and gave a very 'thin' result.
Unison also make fantastic darks, which I find are virtually ignored by other manufacturers. I love their flow, not quite as soft as Sennelier.

Re paper; have you tried Kitty Wallis paper, very popular in the US and will take wet media as well. It's a bit more expensive but high quality

I'm using sanded papers just now (such as Sansfix.)
Most are allergic to water though

Lovely picture, very loose and atmospheric.
His character shines through!


Margaret

Thanks so much Margaret!

I am sorry about the loss of your Unison's. I have a set of Rembrandts I got in 1969, when they were softer and of bettter quality, although they still make nice earth colors.

I had used sanded paper for some commissions about 24 years ago.

Garth

Wow Garth! I love all the subtle and yet vibrant variations of color in the boy's skin. Fun to look at! I guess you prefer oils for their control, but i love the painterly way you use pastel.

I have a set of Sennelier, which I love since before that I'd been using a hodgepodge of miscellaneous cheap stuff I'd had since I was about 10! :) The thing with oil is you can mix and achieve good color with a very limited palette, but with pastel you seem to need lots of colors-- and still that layering seems necessary... That's been my experience, anyway.

Incredible work, as always!

Christy

Hi Christy,

And thanks for the wow! I am glad you feel the same about layering pastels and mixing paint. I was pretty frustrated at first, with the colors and values available only being able to locate to a major metro stop, and not a specific local street address, to use an analogy. But with laering and juxtaposing various neighboring colors, or even triads and compliments together, the desired local color effect comes about. I guess paint can be similarly mixed and juxtaposed on the canvas as well, but it is often more direct and safe to pre-mix the desired color on a palette first. So far, pastels are a slower, but more colorfully expressive way to paint an image for me. Also big corrections like moving an eye a quarter of an inch are easily executed with these pastels, with their layering ability.

Garth

Garth,

Did you really do this from a B&W photo? Or is this from a different series of photos? Either way, it is so impressive! The color vibrancy is indeed remarkable! I also notice a greater freedom in your strokes, as if you felt liberated while working on it. As a result, you can almost see him in motion.

Have you thought about offering a pastel portrait option to clients in your portfolio? This would make an excellent sample.

Garth,

Whether you use your feet or your hands, your work is always top notch, masterful. You're a natural with pastels - the piece you showed me at the conference in Reston, as well as this piece, shows us all how responsive you are to the materials you happen to be using. I suspect that if you were to do a sand painting using only your elbows...it would be a masterpiece.

...the hair is so ALIVE!

David

Hi Alex,

No, this was done from an image that was originally a color slide. I apologize for not being clear about that. I spent some time recently tweaking the colors in Photoshop to make it a better resource image.

Well what the heck, here, I will share the photo below. The likeness is not particularly close, as I was more interested in exploring the color. One day I might do the whole figure if I restore the cropped Nike sneakers. Matt was also the kid in a little oil on panel (12 x 7") from 1998. Also here's a BW photo with evidence that I had a pastel pad out for an attempt 26 years ago! Matt's intense gaze could be haunting.

The chromatic challenge of those fluorescent sweat pants always intrigued me. The particular color of those trousers was elusive to Kodachrome slide film at the time, so I have had to manually interpret and restore it from memory, and paint (I think W&N Permanent Rose come closest as a tubed color).

Garth

Oh thanks, David!

I am sure you have more than sufficient talent to get some real edges and details with these pastels, Like I have not done so far. :D

Garth

Garth, the wonderful thing about this piece is that even though you're exploring a new medium, I see your style coming through and I still get the feeling I'm visiting Planet Garth.

Planet Garth... a land where the edges are soft, there is moisture in the atmosphere, warm breezes waft, the natives are friendly and people trust one another.

Since I can't comment much on pastel technique, not having done many myself recently, I just thought I would throw in this travelogue on your behalf. (Another lovely piece!)

Dear Linda, Thanks!

That place does seem a nice place to visit and be! ;)

Garth

Garth,
you seem to have fun with colors!
In comparison with your other pastel we could admire at the PSA conference which had some very nice color qualities, this one looks more vibrant ( colors, strokes ) and it support the subject ( less quiet than your last one).

I really have no experience with pastels, but here is the pastel demo of Gwenneth Barth at the PSC conference:
I remember that she was beginning with a pastel pencil, and was building layers after layers using hard pastels at the beginning and then softer and softer. When she had to stop, she was a bit frustrated because she thought that the interresting part was just coming...
I hope this can help...

.

Dear Marina,

Cool! That is a helpful demo. It does appear Gwenneth Barth was just getting into the "interesting part"! What a great and free beginning.

I like the distinction of personalities you are discerning between the two pastels.

Well for you to be someone who professes to have no experience with pastels, what are you waiting for?! Your chalk, sanguine, and charcoal drawings are atounding, to say the least!

Garth

Well, it's pretty hard to resist to the temptation, I could spent my whole life experimenting new techniques! But for the moment I try to be reasonable, and to be able to control few ones...

I'm becoming more interested in pastels by the second! The range of approaches seems infinite. Garth, you were working only in soft pastels, then we have the Gwynneth Barth demo, hard to soft, and I'm thinking of Judy Carducci's wonderful demos, too.

Thank you for sharing the reference photos, Garth. Maybe the likeness wasn't the most important thing, but you've definitely caught it. I didn't realize he was the same boy that was in that other painting. (It's obvious now that I know.)

Oooooooh, lucky you, Garth. You got the BIG box of crayons! Your new pastels sound like great fun.

(By the way, I also love the composition with the viewpoint from above showing the boy peeking out from behind the wall. It has a very contemporary feel.)

The oil painting is marvelous too, and thanks for showing the reference photos, I think there is nothing to say about the likeness !
It has been a while since you posted this, do you have new pastels to show here ? What has become of this one, you mentioned you were pausing to show it here, have you left it untouched ? I think it is fine as it is, except maybe for the white area to the left.
Also I wonder about letting the surface of the paper show so much : the pastel pigment itself should not be altered in time, but usually coloured papers fade in time which would change the whole balance of your original work.

Gwenneth Barth has a DVD "Creating A Portrait In Pastel"

I know what they say about working with hard pastels and moving on to softer and softer ones.... But I tend to work the other way around : it is interesting to learn how other people work to give you new insights, but it is so much fun working your way around difficulties all by yourself at first.

Sound advice on paper fading!
 

Jean-Fran