fresh off my dusty easel, pastels by christine dimauro: First Snow, 2 3/4" x 10 1/2", Pastel painted on UArt 500 sanded paper

Monday, February 24, 2014

First Snow, 2 3/4" x 10 1/2", Pastel painted on UArt 500 sanded paper

One of my teeny tiny paintings..... I was showing a student how I would do a watercolor underpainting on UArt... paper, just toning the paper actually. I used a small scrap of paper, and for some reason the colors spoke to me, so I thought I would try a sketch.

For reference, I used a small gouache sketch I did a while ago from a photo I took at Sunken Meadow State Park a few years back. I'd always wanted to do something larger, lol.... this isn't larger, it's about the same size... I guess my next step will be to go larger, I kind of like the color palette, something different.

First the pastel:

Now the underpainting:

And here is the gouache painting:

2 comments:

Observe Closely said...: Excellent progression from gouache (was it small too?) to inspired underpainting to finished pastel. I really enjoyed looking at all three on my screen at once, back and forth among them. Great work! Thanks for sharing.
Jan; February 25, 2014 at 2:13 PM
Christine DiMauro said...: Thank you Jan. Funnily enough the gouache was about the same size. I always wanted to go larger with this one, but the scrap of paper I used to demo my watercolor technique for underpainting was small, about the same size as the gouache. I still want to do this one larger...and I will. It is interesting to look at all thre together, even for me. Thanks for stopping by and commenting, much appreciated.; February 26, 2014 at 12:32 PM

Recommended reading

I love books, especially art books. Here are a few of my favorites.

The Changing Seasons in Pastel or The Pastelist's Year, by Elizabeth Mowry (Her work is magical, her paintings just sing. I also love the way she writes, I own every book she's written.)

Landscape Meditations, by Elizabeth Mowry (You know why....)

The Poetic Landscape by, Elizabeth Mowry (If she had more books, I'd own them.)

Painting the Landscape in Pastel, by Albert Handel (It's Albert Handell, need I say more?)

Intuitive Light, by Albert Handell (Another Albert Handell, need I say more?)

Carlson's Guide to Landscape Painting, by John F. Carlson (The workhorse of landscape books, not an easy read but full of useful information, always a go-to book when a question arises.)

Landscape Painting, Essential Concepts and Techniques for Plein Air and Studio Practice, by Mitchell Albala (some excellent information on landscape composition for any media.)

Pastel Pointers, by Richard McKinley (An all around great book for pastel landscapes.)

Powerful Watercolor Landscapes, by Catherine Gill (this one has excellent information on composition, great for all media not just watercolor.)

The Painterly Approach, by Bob Rohm (It's just that, a painterly approach, and can be easily applied to pastels.)

Your Artist's Brain, by Carl Purcell (This book is great for a beginner, it gives you basics not always touched upon even in advanced books. For advanced painters these reminders are great, we all get moments of brain fog. Much of what is in this book I learned the hard way, I wish I had known about it at the very beginning of my art journey.)