My paintings at MoNA

Blue Road complete

Blue Road, pastel, 5 x 7 inches

Fear of Black

I was recently reminded about fear of black. During my workshops, when I asked students to use a black pastel, some froze, reluctant to reach for that color. It prompted conversations about being taught an art RULE about not using black paint. I do remember giving consideration to that theory in the past by mixing black, enhancing black, etc.

We accidentally hit upon a solution when Sue Anne selected black paper for her afternoon pastel painting. No need to apply black, it's already there! She created a colorful little painting on Canson Mi-Teintes TOUCH with the first step being her color adjustment of the original reference photo. Thanks, Sue Anne for your good work!

Sue Anne's original reference photo

Color adjusted reference photo is on left, finished painting on right, both atop Canson Mi-Teintes BLACK

Landscape, pastel on black, 7 x 5 inches, SueAnne Sullivan 2016

Three Radishes Study

Three Radishes, pastel, 5x7 inches

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This is the study I painted in preparation for last week's Still Life in Pastel Workshop here in my Studio. I limited myself to NuPastels and the exact colors that my students would have. I supplied the paper so we would all have the same experience: Pastelmat, color Buttercup. It was a very successful subject for them, see their paintings in my July 14th post on this blog.

Student Landscapes

Today we painted landscapes! Thanks to Sue Anne, Laura, Reneé and Joan for your beautiful work. Two of these students had never worked in pastel before. It was my pleasure to introduce them to this medium.

Photo by Sue Anne Sullivan

First Student Successes

A great first workshop in my new Studio. Still Life in Pastel. Limited to four students: Sue Anne, Laura, Kay and Reneé each painted along with me in our quest for beautiful radishes. We worked on Buttercup Pastelmat with hard and soft pastels. Sensitivity to stroke and fearless red was our goal. Goal accomplished everyone! Click on image to enlarge.

Photo by Sue Anne Sullivan