Oil Pastel Study with Holbein Oil Pastels

This is an oil pastel exercise that is useful way to explore how colours can be mixed by layering. Rather than use blending tools, the point is to use hatched lines.The lines are spaced apart to allow for the colours to show through.  This also leave the surface area open so that I can continue to add more layers of colour.  The effect is both a physical mix and an optical mix of colours.

I am using two analogous colours that should mix to create a colour that is found in between them.  In this case I used cobalt blue and red violet  with the expected result to be a blue violet.  I wanted the final image to have a coherent colour.  In other words, the different areas should achieve the same colour  so that the final composition looks like a monochrome. Here are the steps that I took to do the demo drawing using three tone of cobalt blue,  red violet  and white.

For each layer of colour, I alternated between doing a red violet layer, then a blue layer.

A key element when doing oil pastel is to always work from lighter to darker and to use a medium to light pressure.  As you can see from the steps above, the composition gets progressively darker as more layers of colour are added.

I hope the oil pastel enthusiasts out there will find this useful.

Initial layer of red violet	Cobalt blue layer
Notice that I am establishing the tones.	Close-up showing different colours and tones
	Final closeup.  The blues and violets are more obvious here.

Les Demoiselles Rousseau

20 x 30 inches,oil/canvas

Finally finished and delivered, this is a family portrait if the three Rousseau sisters, daughters of Mr. M Rousseau.  I composed it from three separate and very different photos.  Two of which were selfies, so it qualifies for my Contact Portrait  series of paintings.  The clouds and balloon play on the profession of their dad.  It was quite a challenging portrait, to say the least!

Impressionist Landscape in Oil Part 2

12 x 16 inches, oil/canvas

Here is part 2 of the Impressionist Landscape painting done in oil.  It is a small landscape study done with my Impressionist class at the Visual Arts Centre in Montreal.  The focus was on achieving the different planes of the landscape, background, middle ground and foreground, using loose brush strokes without getting caught up with too much detail and looking at how cool and warm colours can create luminous lights and shadows.