One Great Reason to Love Pastels

'Symphony of the Seas'        16x20         pastel         ©Karen Margulis
available $300

 There are many reasons of course. Pastels are quite easy to love once you get your hands on some good ones. They are vibrant and luminous and intense and subtle. They are versatile and can be used in so many ways and with so many other materials. I could go on and on singing the praises of pastel.
But today I was reminded of yet another reason to embrace pastels.

 Pastel is a very forgiving medium.

If you aren't happy with a painting it is very easy to make corrections.  There is no such thing as the point of no return with a pastel painting.  There are always ways to revive a painting gone bad. (I have done my fair share of putting this to the test!) You can even paint over a painting without having to scrape or wait for it to dry. It is the perfect medium for impatient artists like myself.

I pulled out an older unfinished demo from my pile. It was a beach scene and I had added some pink beach roses to the dunes. The painting wasn't finished and frankly it was a mishmash of things that I was demonstrating at the workshop. Demos can be like that.....tools to show certain concepts or techniques.  The painting had good n=bones but it needed help.

The original unfinished demo painting

I decided that I wanted to get rid of the pink flowers. I wasn't feeling them!  I looked through my beach photo pile and found one that I could use for inspiration. I likes the subtle colors in the photo and the Queen Annes lace rather than bright colorful flowers.

I sprayed soem workable fixative over the dune grasses of the demo painting and set to work to recreate the scene. It was very easy to go over the original painting with fresh pastel marks. I did use some workable fixative to restore some tooth in the grassy areas but other than that I just painted right on top of the original.  It was like the original painting became my underpainting. I love that about pastel!

my inspiration photo for the redo

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