Advice for working in soft pastel
1 VARY YOUR MARKMAKING
The eponymous hardness of the squarepro led pastels allows them to maintain a consistent edge for longer than soft pastels. They can be shaped with sandpaper, snapped to give sharp edges and are capable of a wide range of di erent marks. It’s always worth buying the pastels in sets rather than as single crayons so that, as they break or wear down, you can accumulate a range of longer and shorter sticks to use for di erent marks.
SUPPORTS, FIXATIVES
Hard pastels like Conté Crayon contain more clay and binders than their soft pastel and pastel pencil counterparts, making them stronger, waxier and a little less powdery than their cousins. Of those media, Conté Crayon is the most versatile, its strength enables it to retain a point like a pastel pencil while its square shape allows it to be used side-on, end-on or point-on. It can be used on most paper surfaces and doesn’t require the heavy paper texture that a soft pastel does, opening a wider range of paper options. Conté Crayon and other hard pastels will smudge easily, so if you are using them in a sketchbook, it is advisable to leave the opposite page blank. Working on any paper, it is always a good idea to x your drawings with a professional quality of xative as cheaper alternatives like hairspray are not always eective and can discolour over time.
2 ERASE AND OVER-DRAW
While Conté Crayon is less malleable than a soft pastel and can’t be moved around as easily with a stump, it can still be erased and re-drawn. The stain that its partially erased marks leave behind has a different surface quality and colour to a raw mark; explore the interaction between these edited and un-edited marks and see if you can find ways to incorporate the erased mark into your drawing. ▸
3 BALANCE COLOUR AND TONE
When you are making a monochromatic drawing on neutral white or grey paper, you are limited to considerations of shape and tone in your drawing. As soon as you introduce a chromatic crayon, like sanguine, or a coloured support like the cream paper in this drawing, you will have new qualities of colour to navigate. Think about how saturated colour will draw the eye in your drawing: do you want it to be everywhere, or localised to areas of interest? Notice how the midtone achieved with a sanguine crayon is warmer than one achieved with a black crayon and think about how you will balance tone, saturation and temperature of hue in your drawing.
4 ADD LIGHTS LAST
As a rule of thumb, add white last in pastel drawing to make sure that it isn’t contaminated by other colours. While white Conté Crayon will cover toned paper and earlier layers of pastel particularly well, it will also mix with other colours on the page, combining with black to make cools greys and with sanguine to create pinks. Be selective with your addition of white and let the paper itself work for you to ensure the highlights are as impactful as possible.