Painting in Pastels E-Book

Robert Brindley

• Herausgeber: Crowood
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

Pastels are an extremely versatile and immediate medium. These characteristics can lead to bold, exciting and impromptu paintings, however, their responsive, flexible nature can also be used to create subtle, gentle colour with little or no texture. This practical book will guide you through the full scope of painting in pastels and explain particularly how they can be used to capture light, colour and texture. With step-by-step instructions in a wide range of subject matter, Painting in Pastels will be invaluable for beginners and experienced artists alike. In it, the techniques are demonstrated and explained; advice is given on subject selection and composition; emphasis is placed on light, tone and colour; and there are sections on painting landscapes, coastal scenery, interiors, still life, figures and portraits. Superbly illustrated with 274 colour illustrations.

Leseprobe

PAINTING IN PASTELS

Robert Brindley RSMA

THE CROWOOD PRESS

First published in 2010 byThe Crowood Press LtdRamsbury, MarlboroughWiltshire SN8 2HR

www.crowood.com

This e-book first published in 2015

© Robert Brindley 2010

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication DataA catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 1 78500 058 4

Front cover: Autumn/The Hermitage Near Whitby 28 × 33cm (11in × 13in)Frontispiece: Golden Light/Venetian Nocturne 23 × 28 cm (9in × 11in)

Acknowledgements

I wish to thank Byron Howard for writing the foreword. Special thanks to all my family, especially my wife Liz, for her invaluable assistance in the writing of this book.

CONTENTS

Foreword by Byron Howard

Introduction

1       Materials and Equipment

2       Getting Started

3       Techniques

4       Plein Air versus the Studio

5       Painting the Landscape

6       Coastal Scenery

7       Other Outdoor Subjects

8       Interiors and Still Life

9       The Figure

10     Observations and Conclusions

Further Information

Index

FOREWORD

Coloured powder, bound to form a stick? What possibilities for aspiring or established artists to engage in creative image making!

Robert Brindley opens up an intriguing and masterful range of opportunities in painting with pastels, the most instant of colour applications. His creative ability, developed through experienced observation and channelled through a highly perceptive analysis of his chosen subject, displays a remarkable authority across the full compass of pastel technique.

Autumn/The Hermitage Near Whitby, 28 × 33cm (11in × 13in).

He presents for us, the viewer, an astonishing orchestration of pastel painting and mark making, creating a wonderment of light, shade and depth. His captivating passages of smoothed pastel glow in the warmth of soft focused sunlight, alternating with serene, cool atmospheric distances, evoking space and a sense of mystery.

The visual tension he creates across the picture plane is often a foreground overlaying of intense electric brilliance, dextrous dashes, telling darks – expressive exuberance with the courage of the moment, held together with draughtsmanship and understanding.

He offers us a colour symphony of moods, magic and mastery of the medium, the creative manipulation of coloured dust.

Byron Howard, Master Sculptor, Travis Studio

INTRODUCTION

The novice paints the leaves; the master suggests the tree.

Anonymous

Pastels are an exciting, versatile medium, ideal for painting, sketching and drawing. They provide the artist with a larger range of instant, vibrant colour than the other painting mediums. Their immediacy when drawing, combined with their richness of colour, make pastels perfect for experimentation and personal expression, either for rapid studies or finished pieces of work. In addition to all these factors, the amount of materials required is less than for oils or watercolours.

Holly, 30 × 25cm (12 × 10in).

Soft pastels are made of pure, powdered pigment, bound together with a carefully measured amount of resin or gum (just sufficient to hold the pigment together), then moulded into stick form. Oil pastels are similar but bound together with an oil medium. Because pastel sticks are made in this way, they are the purest form of applying pigment to a surface. This purity of pigment produces paintings of distinctive strength of colour and luminosity.

In recent years the popularity of pastel painting has grown significantly. There are many reasons for this resurgence; however, I feel that the irresistible range of mouth-watering, pure colours available, coupled with the flexibility of the medium are the primary reasons. Pastels can be worked in a variety of ways, producing paintings depicting soft atmospheric conditions through to bold statements of full colour and imaginative design, where the characteristics of the medium can be fully exploited.

The selection, motivation and interpretation of any subject are of paramount importance to the success of any piece of work, and the use of pastel as your selected medium will allow you unlimited freedom when considering these factors.

Hay Bales, 38 × 30cm (15 × 12in).

Versatility

Being such a versatile medium they are an ideal choice for painting a wide variety of subject matter, such as landscape, still life and portrait painting, to name a few.

Landscape

Artists have always drawn and painted the landscape; perhaps it’s natural to want to capture the beautiful scenery that surrounds us. Landscapes are nearly always at their most appealing during the hour after sunrise and the hour before sunset, but these are also the times when the light is changing the fastest. With their wide range of ready made, vibrant colours, to represent brilliant skies, glowing suns and vegetation bathed in early morning or late afternoon light, pastels offer the artist the ability to capture a scene before the light completely changes.

Bright colours or dark ones, sparkling clarity or misty atmosphere, landscape, still life, portrait – I haven’t met a subject, style or mood yet that can’t be portrayed beautifully in pastel.

Dave Beckett

Still Life

Typically, a still life painting will feature objects such as flowers, fruit, china or other items, arranged to form an interesting group. Successful paintings in this genre are achieved by careful consideration of the way the light falls and illuminates each object within the group. Your ability to observe and reproduce light convincingly is paramount when painting any subject matter; however, this is especially important for reproducing the subtlety of reflected light found in many still life subjects.

Portrait

Before the invention of photography, the only way to get a permanent representation of yourself was to commission an artist. Since the advent of the camera things have changed dramatically and most people have dozens of photographs of themselves. Despite this, portraits remain a firm favourite among sitters and artists alike. As in landscape painting, the immediacy of pastel is also beneficial for portraits. They allow you to capture a likeness quickly, before the sitter gets bored. Layering and blending techniques are perfect for representing soft, translucent skin tones. Having all your colour and tonal options at hand, rather than having to mix them, makes selecting the right ones far easier.

A Brief History of Pastel Painting

Dry pigments made from natural materials were used by early cave-dwellers well before records were kept. Chalk had long been used as a drawing medium. However pastels or chalk, compressed into stick form in many colours, only became available to artists in the late fifteenth century.

Pastels gradually became an established painting medium in the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries as more artists used this form of pastel crayon to produce colour sketches or studies for larger oil paintings. During this time, some artists began to experiment with pastels as a new standalone medium; their subtlety and speed of application developed virtuosity previously unseen.

From that time the medium has grown in popularity and developed far beyond the earlier methods employed. Many of the Impressionists were inspired by the works of Degas, Manet and Toulouse-Lautrec, who popularized the medium by experimenting with the use of different techniques such as linear strokes on top of blended pastel and many more, producing impressionistic works of brilliance and intensity. Degas, in particular, was probably the most influential pastel painter of his time, using an extensive range of techniques and effects; in an attempt to create luminosity, he experimented with cross-hatching, and combined pastel convincingly with virtually every other medium.

As pastels have no oil binder, they do not yellow or crack as oil paintings do. Consequently they have very little need of restoration. The purity of pigment and freshness of soft pastel paintings held in collections worldwide confirms the longevity of the medium.

This book is based on my personal observations and experience, covering materials, subject selection, techniques, the characteristics of pastel and their importance when plein air painting.

The book is organized according to subject matter with chapters dedicated to landscape, coastal scenery, interiors, still life, the figure and more.

To supplement these chapters I have included in-depth step-by-step demonstrations, each with a particular theme, to illustrate the process of producing a painting using pastels.

At the end of most chapters there is a section ‘In the Spotlight’ where I offer the assessment of a completed painting, discussing my reasons for selecting the subject, the motivation, interpretation and finally an evaluation of the completed work, giving particular attention to any weaknesses and possible subsequent corrections if required, and an analysis of the benefits to be gained from this process.

Paintings are, most importantly, a means of communicating your ideas to others without the use of words. I hope that some of the information given in the following pages will help you to succeed in this vital process.

Reflections/Derwentwater, 36 × 36cm (14 × 14in).

CHAPTER 1

MATERIALS AND EQUIPMENT

The painting Scuola Tintoretto/Venice was undertaken as a demonstration painting for an art society and painted on black Hermes sandpaper. The subject was selected to illustrate how a dark ground could be used to enhance the drama of vibrant colour. The painting was developed from the photograph Colours of Venice.

Scuola Tintoretto/Venice, 25 × 36cm (10 × 14in).

Photograph Colours of Venice.

Materials for Starters

The choice of materials and equipment available for the pastel artist is enormous and could easily be daunting to the beginner. The following basic list of materials is intended for those who would like to try painting with pastels on a reasonable budget. It is important, however that you always buy the best quality that you can afford.

Pastels are so forgiving.

Gaye Adams

A Limited Range of Pastels

The first consideration should be given to the selection of a limited range of colours. There are many manufacturers of pastels, often offering slightly different colour palettes and varying degrees of hardness/softness. Most manufacturers make starter sets of 24, 36 or 72 pastels tailored for general work, landscape and portrait. These sets should prove to be quite adequate for beginners, and further colours can be purchased separately as needs demand. The following manufacturers make well-matched starter sets of excellent quality at a reasonable price.

Rembrandt

Rembrandt pastels are a little harder than other manufacturers’, but are an ideal choice for most beginners. Half sticks are available, offering good value for money.

Unison

Unison pastels are superb and can be purchased in several combinations of grouped sets.

Daler-Rowney

Daler-Rowney soft pastels are available in several sets and offer excellent value for money.