New Stuff

Recently I was lucky enough to purchase the stock of pastels belonging to another artist who was leaving the area. In it are a lot of brands which I have never used before including Unison, Terry Ludwig, Diane Townsend, Girault and, the Cadillac of pastels: Henri Roche. They are some of the more expensive brands which I don't usually like to spend the money on. My feeling on the subject is that the most expensive pastels in the world won't necessarily make up for a lack of painting ability, so I'd rather not spend a fortune on materials. I'd rather concentrate on improving my ability to paint in pastel. However, I do like good quality materials. One thing I have learned over time is that student grade stuff will never give the descent results one wants and in fact just adds to the frustration of trying to produce good work using inferior materials. I will try them all though, as I decide which ones to keep and which ones I want to sell.

I also bought some Uart paper, in the 500 grade. It's got a nice smooth finish to it, but it's a buff color and I hate using the whiter papers. I like the neutral gray of Wallis paper, but could see the merits of the off-white if I was to use a wash of some kind, such as watercolor before I begin to paint in pastel. This particular paper doesn't seem to have the toothiness of the Wallis paper, but it is very smooth. On the 2 paintings I recently did on it, I filled the tooth surprisingly fast. I very rarely fill the tooth on the Wallis. So I will have to experiment and try the Uart paper a bit more before I would be able to give a real comparison of the two. I did notice something else about the Uart - it's tough stuff! I often tear large sheets of Wallis paper into smaller sheets simply by creasing the paper and folding it over in the same place repeatedly until the fibers in the paper break down some, making it easy to tear along the fold. I tried to do the same thing with the Uart, but it still didn't want to tear. That surprised me.

I will be trying out all of these variables over the next couple of weeks to see what works best for me.