I had seen the wonderful Eighteenth Century pastel portraits by Maurice Quentin de la Tour and his contemporaries in the National Gallery, London, UK. My ambition was to emulate them and I practised until I achieved portraits that people mistook for photographs of the sitters. Some of these portraits can be seen on the "Past Portraits" page
To see the wonderful portraits by Maurice Quentin de la Tour for yourself visit this link
The two most important pastel painting techniques that I use are
•1) I start the painting by blocking out the main shapes using light non-staining colours. My favourite drawing colours are raw umber on cream coloured paper and gold ochre on grey paper. I use the lightest tones and rub a layer of pastel into the paper. Then I work on top of this layer with medium tones and build up darker and darker tones until the painting is finished. I do not use the dark colours until I know exactly where they must go. This is because dark colours stain the paper and are difficult to erase. A dark colour over a layer of light coloured pastel can be brushed off using a bristle brush or removed using a putty rubber. If the worst happens and the paper is stained, it is possible to remove the mistake using a plastic eraser but it is not good for the surface texture of the paper.
•2)My most important painting tool is a putty rubber or eraser. A small piece can be rolled into a small point and used to push the pastel into the texture of the paper, so the colour of the paper does not show. It is much more useful than a stump because when the point gets dirty I quickly roll it into a new clean point. It can be used many times before it gets too dirty. I can pick up some colour on the point and move it to where I need it. Colour shapers can be useful too but I prefer the putty rubber because it gives a much softer effect.
See an important new tip below.
I am still offering free pastel painting lessons by email
I am very involved in trying to get the grass right at the moment. I erased the ground I had done before and repainted the grass. I am still working on it and it no longer looks like this picture.
See below for A new tip
To see the page with the details and hints and techniques click here
The head tilted "come and play" effect that I wanted is starting to appear.
I fell totally in love with this wolf cub. He held my left wrist gently in his jaws and I was enslaved. He liked me too. Every time I got near the fence of the wolf enclosure he jumped up splattering me with mud.
When I got home no dogs would go near me, including my own old Trixie, until the smell of wolf wore off me and my jacket!
This dog belongs to the owners of Pet's Pantry in Appleby.
I was reminded recently of this when a student got into trouble blending his colours.
I never work with just one sheet of paper on the easel. There is always at least 4 sheets of paper under the paper I am working on. This makes the paper much more responsive to the pressure of the pastels. I once used Canson mount board for a painting. The board had the same texture as the paper but, being hard, it was impossible to cover the high ridges of the paper with pastel and hide the colour of the board.
As well as using a putty rubber for the details I sometimes use a colour shaper or a clay shaper. These are various shapes of a firm plastic type substance. Try the link http://www.colourshaper.com for more information.
I think you can get too tied up in the details using the small size colour shapers, and the putty rubber method is better. But if you really want to get minute detail try this:-
Make a pad out of pieces of pastel paper clipped together. Use the same colour paper that you are painting on if possible.
Use the pad as a palette. Rub generous spots of pastel onto the palette in each of the colours that you need. Then use the colour shaper to mix the colours on the palette. Use the colour shapers to pick up the mixed colours from the palette and apply small touches of pastel to your painting precisely where you need it.
