Summer Meadow Studies

Conté sketching carres on Cartiera Magnani Annigoni paper (light gray-brown tone, 5″ x 8″), September 2009.

Conté carres and pastel pencil on Cartiera Magnani Portofino paper (light cream tone, 6″ x 8″), September 2009.

Unison soft pastel, Conté carres and pastel pencil on Clairefontaine PastelMat paper (white tone, 6″ x 8-1/2″) September 2009 .

Unison soft pastel, Conté carres and pastel pencil on Twinrocker Buff paper (light cream tone, 8″ x 10″) September 2009 .

This series of small studies began as an experiment on different supports.  I recently bought a pad of PastelMat (a surface for pastels that’s new to the United States and has generated a lot of interest) and wanted to try it out while comparing it with other supports I have on hand.  We had just returned from our drive to Pennsylvania last week and the miles and miles of tree-lined meadows with wildflowers that border the highways were still fresh in my mind.  I began with a value sketch in black Conté – which turned out a little more dramatic than the subsequent pastels – and then moved on to various color studies. 

Very early on I recognized a similarity to a step-by-step demonstration in a very good book I have by Albert Handell, and I decided to refer back to that lesson and draw upon it as much as felt useful while not following it slavishly.  In addition to the PastelMat, I also did the study on a piece of Wallis sanded paper and on Richeson Premium Pastel Surface.  I had no fun with these, though, and found myself fighting the  abrasive quality of the supports so I put them aside midway.  I like the PastelMat, on the other hand, and of the abrasive surfaces I’ve used it is by far my favorite.  It feels quite smooth – almost soft – and the grit is just barely perceptible, yet it has a nice “grab” and allows for lots of layering.  For a more complete review of this paper, see this blog post by Richard McKinley. 

In the end, though, I always seem to find myself happiest on some of the handmade papers I use frequently like the Twinrocker paper the last study above was completed on.  I can rub in color with chamois, scrape it off with a palette knife, and layer pastel (although not as densely as on a sanded paper).  Part of it is a romantic appeal the handmade papers have for me, I suppose – each sheet is unique and the feel of it (even the smell of it) adds to the pleasure of the drawing experience. 

Pocono Forest

Conté carres and pastel pencil on Cartiera Magnani Portofino paper (light cream tone, 6″ x 7-1/2″), September 2009.

This is a first color study from the black Conté crayon sketches in my previous post.  I’m intrigued by this type of setting – a sunny spot in the woods that helps draw the viewer in through the trees.  The sunlight provides an area of glowing color within the earth tones and neutrals.  Here, I’ve tried to express the feeling of a warm, somewhat stuffy forest on a late summer day.

Pocono Sketches

Conté sketching carres on Cartiera Magnani Annigoni paper (light gray-brown tone, 7″ x 10″), September 2009.

We spent the past weekend in the Poconos in northern Pennsylvania and enjoyed beautiful weather and scenery.  I’ve been doing more sketching in black crayon recently to strengthen my sensitivity toward values (from light to dark) and to improve my compositional skills.  I worked on a drawing in color with hard pastel as well but struggled with this.  In comparison, these monochromatic sketches flowed pretty easily.  Next, I’ll experiment to see how successfully I can build upon these sketches to produce some more finished drawings in soft pastel at home.

Girls Picking Lavender

Conté carres and pastel pencil on Cartiera Magnani Portofino paper (light cream tone, 6″ x 15″), August 2009.

A happy accident occurred a couple of weeks ago when we were at the lavender fields that have featured in a couple of my recent posts.  After I finished my sketching there, I quickly took a dozen photos of the field for use as reference on drawings back home.  Viewing the photos on the computer a couple of days ago I discovered that in several of them there was a distant group of girls picking lavender (a group of Chinese tourists, my wife thinks).  In my photos they looked like little more than spots, but when I zoomed in some nice compositional possibilities suggested themselves.  Here, I’ve rearranged three of the people and have left out the others in order to arrive at something that hopefully feels natural yet balanced.  I’m working on some other variations now in soft pastel.

More Lavender, Whistler Pastels at the Frick

Unison soft pastel, Conté carres and pastel pencil on Twinrocker Calligraphy Cream paper (light cream tone, 9″ x 9″) August 2009 .

Here’s a first effort in soft pastel of the lavender field I posted sketches of last week, done on a nicely textured handmade paper from the Twinrocker mill in Indiana.  I finished the “underpainting” in rubbed soft pastel last night and fixed it, and my wife said she liked it just as it was and I should stop.  Now that the remainder of the work is done on it she insists that it was better before but I’d have to disagree.  The rubbed under-colors I used were all neutrals and it had an especially muted effect, although the forms were distinguishable.  This “reads” more like the nice, sunny day that it was and the color of the lavender is closer but still not quite right.  I plan to work on this theme a little further and – if I’m especially productive – may have more to post tomorrow. 

Last night after work I finally got to the Frick Collection to see the exhibit there of “Portraits, Pastels, and Prints” by James Abbott McNeill Whistler.  I’m a very big fan of Whistler’s pastels – for an excellent survey of them, this book is a great resource.  Unfortunately, the show at the Frick is ending this weekend (yes, I nearly missed it).  The works presented are the twenty pieces acquired by Henry Clay Frick  from 1914 to 1919, including five oil paintings (four portraits and a seascape), three pastels, and twelve etchings.  The pastels are gems and for me were well worth the price of admission alone.  Photo reproductions don’t do the colors justice; the gently applied pastels simply glow on the dark brown paper Whistler used.  All three pastels are from the time he spent in Venice, and one of them – The Cemetery – is included in the book I linked to above.  Nocturne: Venice was a particular favorite for me.  Most of the paper is left untouched by pastel to suggest hazy darkness, while only the water and sky are lightly veiled in color, with the yellow of distant lights applied in delicate, thicker strokes.  While many artists who work in pastel layer color on thickly, adjusting value and hue to arrive at a final desired effect, Whistler’s light touches of pastel require that just the right value and color is used.  His great skill is highly evident in these three beautifully composed pastels.  These are the first of Whistler’s pastels that I’ve seen in person, so spending time with them last night was a real treat for me.  By the way, I stumbled across another book this morning that includes Whistler’s pastels and am wondering whether anyone has looked at the book – it’s a very pricey volume so I’d like to know how comprehensive it is before I splurge on it.  It would certainly be a thrill to have a book that contains most if not all of Whistler’s pastels.

Lavender Field Studies

    

Conté carres and pastel pencil on Cartiera Magnani Velata paper (1st drawing – light cream tone, 9″ x 12″), and Cartiera Magnani Portofino paper (2nd and 3rd drawings – 4″ x 4″), August 2009.

We took a drive out to the north fork of Eastern Long Island two weeks ago on a beautiful Saturday.  Our mission was wine-tasting, and we visited a couple of wineries and bought a few bottles, and then had a really nice picnic lunch at a vineyard.  In the afternoon we came upon a small farm with fields of lavender and a shop so we stopped by for a visit.  I set up my easel in the shade and did the drawing at top left.  With the field in the bright afternoon sun of a clear day, I struggled to get the right purple and made a mental note to myself that the lavender was more of a deep, gray-purple than then pinkish tone I arrived at on site.  Back home, I’ve done a number of smaller studies from my original sketch – partly to explore composition for a more simple and abstract take on the lavender field, and partly to experiment with this hot-pressed paper I’ve been enjoying using (Portofino by the Magnani mill).  More studies will likely follow since I have the rough sense of an abstract composition that I would like to derive from these drawings but haven’t quite gotten it worked out on paper yet.  I’m also rather stuck these days in a long spell of feeling frustration at most of what I do at the easel and I’ve had to remind myself to just have fun and stop worrying about the results.  These studies serve that purpose well at least since it’s been a pleasure to work with so much purple lately.

Upstate New York Studies

Drawings (from left to right):

1. Conté carres and pastel pencil on Cartiera Magnani Annigoni paper (light gray-brown tone, 7″ x 10″), August 2009.
2. Conté carres and pastel pencil on Cartiera Magnani Portofino paper (light cream tone, 6″ x 15″), August 2009.

We spent the weekend upstate and the fields were beautiful, filled with tall golden-brown grasses and yellow flowers.  I worked outdoors on two studies using papers from the Magnani mill I haven’t previously tried.  The results you get with hard pastels like the Conté crayons I frequently use are highly dependent on the texture of paper, and I’ve been feeling a pull towards surfaces that are very smooth.  In fact, the Portofino is actually a really nice hot-pressed watercolor paper.  I’ll be experimenting with both of these papers more in the coming days, trying to strengthen the quality of my mark-making while avoiding muddiness in my colors.  I’ll also be trying the Annigoni paper out with soft pastels, as I’ve got a feeling that – despite the paper’s smooth surface – soft pastel will be responsive to its texture if applied in thin veils of color with a gentle touch.

Sands Point, East River Studies

   

Conté carres and pastel pencil on Cartiera Magnani Velata paper (light cream tone, 5″ x 7″ & 8″), July 2009.

More plein air studies, this time from Sands Point, Long Island (the first two) and another from the East River near our apartment (the last one).

East River Studies

     

Conté carres and pastel pencil on Cartiera Magnani Velata paper (light cream tone, 5″ x 7″), July 2009.

After my recent Alaska drawings, I felt like I wanted to draw locally en plein air, and on a small scale with a warm color bias.  When I got home from work last night I found a quiet spot along the river a couple of blocks from our apartment and finished the first drawing just before sunset.  This morning, I managed to complete three more studies near the same spot.  I’m hoping to do more of these local drawings in the coming days, stepping up my productivity and exercising my drawing-from-life skills.  I’m also trying to utilize a full spectrum of color here with pinks, purples, reds, and red-browns to offset the dominant greens and blues.  I got a bit muddy with the color in some of these drawings and will need to practice my approach to try to keep things fresh.  The small scale I used here was nice but I think I’d prefer a longer proportion, maybe 5″ x 9″ next time…

Alaska, Near Denali

 

Drawings (from left to right):

1. Unison soft pastel over Windsor & Newton watercolor on Arches watercolor paper (white tone, 7″ x 10-1/4″), July 2009.   
2. Conté pastel pencil and Unison soft pastel on Cartiera Magnani Pastello paper (light blue tone, 9″ x 12″), July 2009.  

My productivity lately has been somewhat slow but I’ve (finally) finished a couple of new pastels based on sketches and photos from our recent trip to Alaska.  This broad sweep of distant river near Denali begs further study and is a composition I’ll probably continue to work with in the coming months.  In both versions above I’ve tried for a very atmospheric feel, first using watercolor washes as an underpainting and in the second building up lots of cross-hatched, loose lines in pastel pencil and soft pastel.  These beautiful vistas were a constant source of amazement for us throughout our travels in Alaska – wilderness as far as the eye can see with no roads, buildings, or power lines.