Choosing Paper Size to Fit the Subject

'Looking for Lavender'           18.5 x 12           pastel             ©Karen Margulis
available $250.00

I have been doing a lot of armchair traveling these days. Reminiscing about past adventures and dreaming of the future trips yet to come. I am so fortunate to have ad the opportunity to travel the last several years. I never turned down a trip and I have no regrets! One of the best trips was my bucket list trip to see the lavender in Provence. It had all of the right elements.....wonderful friends, a charming home base, great food and wine and amazing and inspiring scenery. ...and lots of lavender. I have enjoyed pulling out my photos and painting from them. Today's painting is from one of our touring days. We started early and stayed out all day trying to see as many lavender fields as we could.

You can read the blog post I wrote and see photos of that day here:

http://kemstudios.blogspot.com/2018/07/painting-provence-part-2-bring-on.html

Here are a few step by step photos. I used a failed painting that was on old Wallis paper. I liquified the pastel with alcohol to get a muddy base. I chose the paper because of it's odd size of 18.5 x 12. It suited the point of view I wanted....standing on a hill looking over the fields. As soon as I saw the old painting in my pile I knew it would be perfect to express the expanse of fields I remembered.

TIP: Paper size matters! You can really make a subject come alive with the right size and orientation of paper. Give it some thought. Ask yourself what you hope to express.  What is your story? Choose paper size and orientation to fit your story. 

Here are the initial layers along with the reference photo. I need to create depth and a patchwork of fields and trees.

Here is the second pass of pastels. I layered some warm colors to go under some of the green fields.