ARTIST’S HINTS AND TIPS

Use fixative at various stages, particularly if you notice your bright pastel work is becoming muted and muddy. Fix your work at the end too. Break your pastel sticks into smaller pieces. Don’t try to keep a stick in pristine condition. You bought them to use them.

Enjoy the messiness and use your fingers to spread and blend colours– you might need to vacuum chalk and dust up afterwards if you have been too vigorous.

Don’t be afraid to put your frame of reference down (eg if you are using a photo/picture as a starter) and just go with what you feel. Whatever colours you use, make them appear across your work in a range of places.

Try to have an uninterrupted block of time to work. I did this piece over two hours with cooking, serving and eating dinner mixed in to the time frame. Sometimes a break refreshes you and helps you see your piece in a new light. Other times it makes it challenging to focus on the project or to lose yourself in the process.

Work on layers of contrast – light pastel, then block in with another colour, then block in with black, then back to the light colour again. Always make your last two colours on your almost finished piece white and black, or darkest and lightest – highlighting eyes and lips in particular. Buy a big plastic sleeve so you can store your pastel work in it – this way you can still keep the work you decide not to frame, and come back and appreciate what you like and don’t like some other time.

Don’t put pressure on yourself, just let things evolve. Knowing this was my demonstration piece for Artist’s

Palette changed the process a bit for me. (I was less relaxed and felt the pressure of a deadline to finish it and concern about whether it ‘was or would be good enough’ to use as an example. Then towards the end I lost interest and connection with the work. In my subconscious I think this piece was ‘something I had to do’ to meet a deadline. It was more like a chore to tick off amongst all the other things in my diary. The creative process was challenged even before I started. But I still enjoyed the doing of it). If you get bored, or lose interest with your piece, just stop. It is no big deal. You don’t have to love everything you do.

Enjoy the process. If your final piece doesn’t leave you in raptures that is ok. Let whatever happens be ok. You have spent time creating, fed your soul, and started the craving to do the next piece.