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Wednesday, March 27, 2019

New Video Demo Release: Explore Mark Making with a Nest Painting

'For Every Bird a Nest'            11x14          pastel         ©Karen Margulis


I love painting nests! Every year when spring rolls around I get the itch to paint a nest!  We were lucky last year to have several birds nesting in our yard so I got some new reference photos. One of the things I love about painting nests with pastels is that I get to be a bird. Yes that is what I said! I get to think like a bird.

I use my pastels to lay the foundation for the nest. And then I slowly and carefully build the layers weaving colors with linear marks. Some thick. Some thin. Around and around I go weaving the ends of straw. Tucking in bits here and there. My marks are gradually getting finer and tighter making a soft and strong home for the eggs.

Click below to see the video demo on YouTube. And be sure to hit the like button and subscribe to my channel while you are there!




close up detail of nest

Using a variety of marks to build a nest

3 comments:

Debbie Nolan said...

Karen love this painting. Your variety of colors in the nest are just gorgeous. Thanks for sharing.

Unknown said...

AWESOME. You encourage me constantly to get to those pastels. My goal is 3 times a week at the moment. I can see how you have learned while teaching too. I am a silver level gal and it is so worth the money.

Maria Blassingame said...

Thanks for sharing your photo and info. I truly appreciate your efforts and I will be waiting for your next post thank you once again.