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Tuesday, October 04, 2011

Warm vs Cool Paper


'The Empty Lot I & II' 5x7 pastel
Do you give any though to the color or value of the paper you use for your pastel paintings? Or do you use the paper that is on top of the pile? I do both but when I really want to be sure to capture a certain mood or feeling in a painting I will choose a paper color or tone my paper a color that will help me convey the mood. Here I have done two paintings with the same few pastels. The top version is on cool blue paper and the bottom painting is on orange Canson paper. Can you see the subtle difference in mood between the two? One is cooler and more serious while the other is sunnier and happy. Now I want to try some other paper colors to see what happens!

Price $50 USD
each.
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9 comments:

ddd said...

Hi Karen!
Great paintings, I like them both but especially love the "cool" one. Well done!

And, what a funny coincidence since I was going to play with different paper colours tonight and comare the effects. Your post came just in the right time :)
Cheers

Cmichaudart said...

both lovely but I personally go for the one below, orange does put one in a playful mood. Good demo.

Ida M. Glazier said...

Karen, so cool to see your blog!! and to see Dalibor here with his comment! He is such a good painter, I was with him and others at a Bill Cone workshop this summer (July) and he is very very good in his own right and will go places!! Anyhow, Love your new work and your experiments and thoughts of the color of the paper you choose for a painting. Its all such a learning experiance---I have found for a sunny , happy, daylight painting in summer that PINK is a good choice. I goes so well with those summer greess, and blues fo the sky and shadows!! A pleasent surprize. At the Cone Workshop, we all used Canson's Twilight, and now I love it!! So good for areial perspective, and the light!! For some water painterings, when you look right into a stream, tobacco is good! Chavez uses Moonstone, and I must admit, I love it too, for the dessert-y places where I live. Keep up the good work! I do enjoy your paintings. (IMaybe)from WC!

pattrsnd said...

These are beautiful Diana!!

pattrsnd said...

I meant "Karen"...sorry!!

Karen said...

Thank you all so much! It is great to read your feedback. I appreciate you all visiting my blog and I hope that you enjoy!

Karen said...

Thanks Dalibor! I hope you had fun with the paper color experiment! Thanks for visiting my blog:)

Karen said...

Thanks Ida! Good to see you here! I appreciate the info on the paper colors. I will have to try the twilight. I have only been using Moonstone!

Karen said...

Thanks David! Glad you enjoyed them. I appreciate the comment!!