Self Portrait in White Pastel on Black Paper

I don't do portraits often; of humans that is. But, after I finished this one of me I decided I would try  some more in this style, with these materials. Right now I'm finishing up a graphite drawing of grooming cockatoos because I'm always working but I've been going through old family photos and I thought I would use them to build a portfolio of portraits. 

But on to the project at hand which happened partly because I wanted to do something different (a portrait) and partly because, once again, as I said in my last post, color is getting in the way again. So I put away the pastels and the colored pencils and eliminated charcoal from my list of media (way too messy for me) and set aside the water soluble graphite because painting in a wet medium, however little water is involved, in any way just doesn't feel comfortable to me right now. I always feel good when I work on black paper with white pastels. 

I used white Pan Pastels, a white pastel pencil and a black pastel pencil on black Stonehenge watercolor paper to create this portrait. I had taken this selfie about five years ago and decided it would be a good project. I desaturated the image and used it as my reference photo.

I only took two photos of the process although there was a lot of build up and a great deal of tweaking. This is a photo I took of the face but it was far from completed.

And here I started to work on hat and scarf while making changes to the face. I don't remember how long this project took; maybe three hours. When I'm working, if I don't tape, I lose track of time.

And here is my completed piece. I worked a lot on my right eye, the one behind the bangs to make it just dark enough not to be too visible but not to be too light as to through off the balance of the work. The nose was off as well; a little low on the shadow side so it needed to be raised. And I worked on the light and shadow continually to get it just right. Then I started to run out of tooth and I had to stop. Working on cap and scarf was a bit of a challenge since this sort of detail isn't my strong suit and a reason I will never be a photorealist artist. But I achieved the softness I wanted and enough detail to indicate knitted clothing. As I said, I'll never be a photorealist.

 

What have I been up to?

 It's been 8 days since my last post and I am trying to add content once a week. But hey, I'm the only one checking on me so it's no big deal unless of course you're following me and you want to see what I've been up to. 

It happened again. Color has once again gotten the better of me. I painted this white tiger from Wildlifereferencephotos using Pan Pastels, Caran D'ache pastel pencils, a bunch of blending tools and black Stonehenge cold press water color paper. It's 9 x 12 inches. I am pleased with it. I really like the way I handled the background.  If you click on the image of the tiger you can watch a timelapse demonstration of the creation of the  painting.

This was not the case with this image of a house sparrow I painted using Pan Pastels and a few pastel pencils. But when I was finished I just didn't want to deal with color even though both of these pieces were done with a limited primary color palette.

Okay. You must have seen this coming. I jumped back into the "Sometimes Color Gets in the Way" mindset. The chickadee is a bird I've painted and drawn before. I like the bird. It never fails to inspire a sweet image. I used white Pan Pastel, Caran D'ache white pastel pencil and black charcoal. It was done in thirty minutes. 

This portrait is based on a selfie I took of myself five years ago. Some friends and family members didn't like the photo and felt that, while the work is good, I am much prettier. I  love these folks, some of whom haven't seen me in a while, forget how old I am now but that's a story for another time. I am please with the work. I spent two days going back to it; touching up, making adjustments to placement and shadow. It's a good portrait. It looks like the selfie which looks like me. What I like most about this particular self portrait is that I remind myself of a Tomte, a Scandinavian elf. 

But, when I was done, I wasn't happy about where I was going creatively. l felt I need to work on white paper as well as black; I needed to create form out of light just as I had created form out of darkness. There is no video of this portrait or the chickadee. It's been two years since I drew. Really drew. That was the last time color got in the way. 

I started with charcoal. I have a nice collection of charcoal including some lovely pencils from Winsor and Newton. It was a disaster and I didn't get beyond the background.  I put away the charcoal and got out my box of graphite pencils and blending sponges and created this drawing of a Great White Egret. Thanks to Lynn Smith who took the photo and gave me permission to use it.  

I do like this piece and it already has a home to go to. I used a rendering technique in which I covered the paper with powdered graphite and initially drew in the egret with an eraser. Then I built up the contrast with increasingly darker pencils until I come up with this image. I did video tape this one but it won't be up for three weeks or a bit more. This drawing isn't as fine as I would have liked but that is largely because of the technique so my next piece will be on white paper (I have so much beautiful white paper). No rendering. No powder. A bit of blending with stumps and or sponges and erasers. I don't know what the subject is yet. But I'm back with graphite; ultimately my dearest medium. 

Sometimes I feel like the pendulum in a grandfather clock (as opposed to the one in the Pit and the Pendulum by Poe) just swinging back and forth never able to find a landing place. But sometimes I realize it's the only way to grow as a visual artist. Sometimes my work is brilliant. Sometimes it's not. But always it's fun; absorbing; meditative. Time doesn't matter whether I'm creating masterpieces and not masterpieces. I'm thinking about the Ticonderoga #2 pencil. You can do so much with it.

Pan Pastel Painting of Tropical Birds

Click on the image to see my YouTube video time lapse demo of this image.

Hit a wall...

 

Pan Pastels and a couple of pastel pencils on 15 x 22 inch watercolor paper. I call it Tropical Birds. 

And then art made it come crumbling down. Well, slowly, but crumbling. I just had a monumental birthday and while going into it I had no issues, somehow it was a mostly unfortunate day. Emergency and expensive car repairs, late for work, and a frantic, tech ignorant patron taking up most of my time. But a man at the copier told me 8 was a sweetheart and frantic girl was conciliatory and polite when she left. Then I went home to a difficult situation with my other vocation as a caregiver.  

Issues with Skillshare was on the next day's agenda as I worked on the project posted above. I finally finished it today  and I almost like it. But it is pretty. I'll work on the video tomorrow. I'll have to be creative in my editing. I didn't tape it all. 

Oh, what was the problem? Is this all I have to look forward to in the remaining time on this plane? Like the Peggy Lee song, "Is that all there is?" A big question pressing on mind and heart. I turned to prayer and meditation on the Tao for answers and nothing came ... No thoughts, just actions carried out without thought. I was drawn to order more of the black Stonehenge paper and selected a new image to paint. I realized as I was doing this in the space of 30 minutes that Art with a capital A is here for me. Suddenly I realized that I just didn't need to worry myself about worldly things. I was at peace. I could go about my daily routine without concern as long as I nurtured my creative self. 

I know all this may sound heady or preachy  or even sentimental but, for two days I held back the tears as I tried to make sense of my life. I thought about what I would have done differently as if thinking about it could change things. Oddly, it did because in making the changes in my daydream in a different life I realized that  being an artist was the one thing I wouldn't have undone. But, I would have done it sooner and differently.

No photos.....

 I won't share any photos for this post. I took none. I was very disappointed in the project. Not the beautiful reference photo I created. Well, I'll share that photo.

I used Photo Shop to create this composition of three macaws, a parrot and a toucan. I have painted in portraits of all of these beautiful birds in a variety of media from oils to pastels. 

What went wrong? I wasn't able to achieve the softness and the energy I had using the watercolor paper. I used a 12 x 16 sanded paper that I had used before but in the past, pencils were used over the pastels. For whatever reason, I wasn't able to get the images to build using just the Pan Pastels. I used brushes as well as Soft tools. It didn't matter. Having completed the macaws, I called it quits. Well, I tinkered with Toucan but something was missing. So I tossed it. I put all of my tools and colors away. 

Sometime last night I decided I would use watercolor paper. This morning I pulled out a 22 x 30 inch sheet of watercolor paper and wow. I had to move everything off of my drafting board to accommodate the paper. I cut it down to 15 x 22 inches and pulled out all of materials. Yesterday I used a limited palette of blue, orange, green and the shades and tints as well as black and white. That was also part of the problem. I had lost the cohesiveness my primary color palette brought to the party. I haven't done a large pastel in decades and those were 19 x 22. I used soft pastels and they were beautiful. I amazed myself with how good they were but then I stopped using them and moved back to acrylics. Now I'm using pastels again.

This painting won't be done in under an hour. That's great. I do enjoy getting lost in the process. 

Moving on with my craft.....

 

This is the latest of my Pan Pastel paintings. This is moving quickly and I am so enjoying the process. I'm collecting images of other birds with an eye on a large painting of several birds. I have an urge to paint larger pieces. I'm not sure how that will pan out in terms of my videos but  I really want to stretch. I feel as though I am on the brink of realizing my true potential as an artist whatever that is. 

It won't really be that large. 12 x 15 to start. White Clair Fontaine Pastelmat paper is what I have so that's what I'll use and it will dictate the size of the birds and the pallet. I want Blue Macaws in it. A Toucan. I'm not certain who else will star in this production.  Stay Tuned.

Oh and if you want to watch this YouTube video click on the parrot. Thanks for stopping by.

I think I found my way...

 

This is Fiona. My sister-in-law's Chorkie (Yorkie/Chihuahua mix). Fiona is one of my favorite models and I have done many, many portraits of this lovable dog. In this portrait as with that of last week's chicken, I used only a limited palette (black, white, red, yellow, blue and yellow ochre) of Pan Pastels and a few tools. No pencils. No soft pastels. I love it. I love just working with Pan Pastels and creating these soft, impressionistic style paintings. Oh sure, with some pastel pencils I could have turned this work into a realistic rendering, practically photo-realistic. Well not really since I'm not Chuck close. But what I want is to create beautiful paintings without thought to painstaking detail. I want my work to be free-flowing and energetic. I got that here. 

I've done several works in the past year using only Pan Pastels but many others with pastel pencils as well. Not sure where I wanted to take my use of this medium, underneath was my desire to use just one medium and this is it.  I finished this piece and the last in under an hour without intending to be quick. I just started and worked and stopped because my piece was done. 

I am so pleased that I'll continue to create images with Pan Pastels and nothing else. Wow! Just Wow! It's a Eureka moment. You can watch this creation in time lapse on YouTube. I'd like to say I can ditch my other supplies but I can't. I teach so I need those media to share but I can see a time when what I'll be teaching will be my particular technique with Pan Pastels. I know to some folks this may not seem like a big deal but I've been searching for this all of my life; a medium that works for me. As I aged and arthritis complicated the use of my fingers and hands I've been forced to limit the media I used and adapt those that I love to my limitations. 

Wow! it feels so good. It feels like coming home.