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Author: Marc_R._Hanson, Contributing Editor
| Here is the station where I work on pastels. As you can see I have my oil sketch placed to my left on a separate easel.
|  | To the right is my pastel palette. |
 | I use the same palette of pastels whether I am in the studio or outside painting. It's about 16"x20" and fits onto the drawer of my French easel. When I'm ready to take it into the field, I attach a secure fitting lid, that I made, to hold the pastels in place. I have them arranged without any divisions. I find it useful to be able to see the entire 'spectrum' of hues that I have to work with. I have found that this arrangement makes selection of hues more intuitive. My pastels are a mix of brands... Unison, Schmincke, Girault, Rembrandt, Nupastel, Winsor & Newton and others.
The other supplies that I use are Wallis paper mounted on rag matboard, a big hunk of several kneaded erasers, kneaded together, and to me most importantly...'VIVA' paper towels. I haven't found another paper towel that will move the pastel around without removing most of the pigment in the process. Other than a graphite pencil and a chamois or bristle brush for removing pastel, I don't use many other supplies. To the right I have pictured my palette of gouache colors. For this piece ultramarine blue, alizarin crimson and yellow ochre were used for the lay in. I use a nylon bristle brush to apply the gouache, natural bristles don't hold up to the Wallis paper. |  |
 | The method that I'm showing here is only one of many. This is one way that I have become comfortable with and employ most of the time. I have used many boards and papers both pre-prepared surfaces and surfaces prepared by me. Wallis paper is my surface of choice. It has enough tooth to hold a lot of pastel and is uniform enough to not 'eat' all of my favorite pastels in one stroke. That saves me money, and I like that very much!!!
One thing that I really like about Wallis paper is how it takes pencil. I almost always do some drawing with the pencil before starting the pastel painting. The drawing is only there to indicate where elements of the design will go. It isn't a heavy drawing and it isn't followed like a coloring book, it is in fact almost completely covered in the next step. I have mechanically darkened it so that it is easier to see here. I follow this same procedure whether I am outside painting or in the studio painting. |
| I usually do an underpainting to 1) establish the patterns of color and value quickly, and 2) to save on the pastel until I'm confident that I know where I want the painting to go.
I use gouache ( Winsor & Newton ) for the underpainting, instead of water color, acrylic or oil, for a couple of reasons. The gouache is used as thin washes, it drys fast and leaves fairly saturated pigment on the paper. Watercolor will work too, but it doesn't have the saturation of gouache. When I do this underpainting, I don't spend more than a few minutes on it because I want to get to the application of the pastel. Using gouache as a medium let's me get the job done fast and efficiently. Acrylic might work too, but then I have to squeeze it out each time making sure the brush is washed out well, and clean the palette which is too time consuming in the field. Gouache is in the palette in the 'cake' state and is just moistened and used. It can always be cleaned up and out of the brush at a later time after the painting is finished or at home. Oils just don't dry fast enough to be of use in the field as an underpainting. Sometimes I don't use any underpainting, especially if I'm using the 'Belgian Mist' Wallis paper, I just go straight ahead with the pastel. To create the underpainting when doing this, I block in the pastel and then use the paper towel to 'wash' the pigment (smear) around the image before continuing with the finishing layers of pastel. Below are the first steps in the gouache block in. All I want in this step is to establish the approximate shapes in the landscape with color and value that is close to what it I see. The gouache will dry lighter and weaker on the paper, so I conscientiously make the mixtures a little stronger in both value and color intensity. |
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