Feeling blue? not exactly!!!!

Sometimes, we artists are drawn to a particular colour..  Although I do  paint or create using a variety of different colours, something inside me begins to celebrate whenever I use blue, in all its varieties.  I love the richness of royal blue, the tranquility of turquoise, the lightheartedness of pale, limpid blue - all blues in fact.    I also enjoy  red...but there are certain feelings that red stirs in me, which are not always tranquil!  Ia am sure that many of you respond favourably to certain colours, and less favourably to others.  There has been much exploration of the psychology of particular colours and the human reaction to them.  This is just one small paragraph I have found about blue:

Blue is the colour of the mind and is essentially soothing; it affects us mentally, rather than the physical reaction we have to red. Strong blues will stimulate clear thought and lighter, soft blues will calm the mind and aid concentration. Consequently it is serene and mentally calming. It is the colour of clear communication. Blue objects do not appear to be as close to us as red ones. Time and again in research, blue is the world's favourite colour. 

It is good to have a favourite colour...but do be a little careful not to use it relentlessly or unthinkingly- I have seen many a painting, for example, where the shadows are all painted with the same shade of purple, regardless of the objects those shadows fall upon. Yet, shadows are transparent and therefore have to contain something of the colour of whatever they fall upon.  Using a favourite colour "for shadows" is simply using a formula.

Today I plan to show you a few recently-created pieces. All of them blue.  Or bluish.  Or blue-green.  Even the landscape - I simply do not like khaki green or yellow green or sludge green, so I lean towards the blue-green spectrum for my landscapes.

 These pieces are available for sale if any of them resonate for you - just drop me a line and I will give you a pre-Christmas sale price!

Here is a pastel painting just completed, one of my "foxglove" series.  It can be sent out unframed, rolled, covered in Glassine paper, so that you can frame it yourself or have it framed to your taste. It means I am able to provide an original for far less than you would pay in a gallery, so it is a rather special opportunity.

This chunky "Whirlpool" bowl of gorgeous turquoise blue glass, with its swirling bubbles trapped inside the glass, has a textured underside and a smooth surface inside.  It is 9" wide and about 2" high at the rim.  It is a one-of-a-kind piece, very unusual and very different.

I love this little enamel on copper trinket bowl.  The colours really sing.  On the outside, a fascinating mix of blue, white and turquoise, the colours flowing into each other like sea foam and ocean depths;  inside a soft, cloudy mix of gold and minty green.  It is 4" wide at the top, and 2.5" high.

Finally, here is a Lace Glass bowl...A bowl with holes - not so good for soup but great for just-washed grapes!!!  Wash the grapes, pop them onto this bowl, put it onto a plain plate and any remaining drips will fall thro the holes rather than sit in the bottom the bowl.   If grapes are not your thing, then you can use it for wrapped candies, or just leave it on a table for guests to admire - everyone wonders how the holes are achieved in GLASS!  It is really pretty, with flashes of rich blue and turquoise, along with soft white swirls in the glass. 9" wide, and just under 2" high at the rim.

Blue may not be the primary colour of Christmas, but a blue Christmas gift will always be welcome.

CANSON MI-TEINTES TOUCH

Thought I would give you a "new product" report and recommendation.

 Canson, the maker of the well-known and popular Canson Mi-Teinte pastel papers, have now produced this new surface which can be used for pastel, oil pastel, pencil, charcoal and acrylics.  It has a thinly sanded surface, which feels smooth with a slight texture, but will not shred your fingers like regular sandpaper!  Every sheet and board has a white “margin”, useful for framing purposes. You can even use the reverse side of the sheet if you are unhappy with your efforts on the sanded side!

I paint often with pastels, so I tried the paper out while wearing my pastellist's beret.

Most pastel painters like the ability to layer with different colours in order to achieve rich effects.  I found that layering is fine up to about 4-5 layers*(see tip below), without the use of fixative. A burst of fix at this point would allow me further layers - I recommend Spectrafix as a fixative, it is not only excellent,  it is also, unlike virtually all other fixatives, non-toxic (more in another blog post). 

You can use watermedia on this surface -  watercolours, gouache or ink -  to prepare an “underpainting” for pastels, which I have demonstrated above. 

   my demo sheet  is the Steel Grey card - it shows purple and green watercolour washes loosely applied to the surface, with a covering of pastel, using side strokes, lines, broken colour and blending.  There are faint brown lines under the pastel and the watercolour washes…these were drawn using a waterproof Indian ink artist pen with a soft “brush” tip – these lines cover easily with pastel because of the abrasive surface. I find these kinds of pens useful for initial drawing under pastel, since unlike charcoal, they will not lift or affect subsequent application of colour.

  I worked these demo pieces on the 355 gsm sheets …which did buckle VERY slightly when I used very wet washes, but it was nothing to worry about as it flattened down as it dried.  However,  there will be much more substantial, larger, boards available, 1255 gsm - which will stay completely flat even with a watermedia applied.  These are marvellous – I have found nothing like them on the market.  Previously if I have wanted to work with lots of water for an underpainting, I have had to secure my sheets down onto board…all this work is done for you with these terrific boards.  £9.90 (UK)  may seem expensive when compared to the price of a sheet of paper…but the boards cannot actually be compared to paper, they are far more versatile than paper, they are a quality product, to be compared to a good quality canvas.

I like to use harder pastels to begin with, working towards softer pastels for the “upper layers”, so that I don't  fill the tooth of the paper too quickly.  The surface is excellent for fine lines, for x-hatching and other textural marks, for blending of colours, and for layering with side strokes. 

Given the super colours, and the different sizes of pads, card and board, this product is a first-class addition to an artist’s arsenal of materials.  I have long been a fan of Canson Mi Teinte papers, and I will most certainly be using Canson Mi Teinte Touch for my own work, for both pastels, and for acrylics.   I really enjoyed painting “ATHABASCA FALLS (Canada)”, shown large above,  on Dark Grey Mi Teinte Touch card, working swiftly and freely with both hard and soft pastels, without any preliminary drawing or underpainting, to recreate my memory of the dramatic rushing water vigorously tumbling over the rocks towards shadowy blue depths.

  

Colour range: black, dark grey, steel grey, flannel grey, indigo blue, light blue, sky grey, twilight ( a soft grey-purple) wineless (maroon) tobacco, sepia, sand, cream, white.

Card weight 355 gsm  size 50x65cm    

Board weight 1255 gsm  size 50x70cm  

Pads:

Size 24x32  - 12 sheets card  black, d grey, steel grey, tobacco, sand, cream 

Size A3 – 12 sheets card as above.

I have not listed prices, because these will vary depending on your location.  

Here are the available colours:

black 425  Ref. 200005925
dark grey 345  Ref. 200005926
flannel grey 122  Ref. 200005928
light blue 490  Ref. 200005930
twilight 131  Ref. 200005932
tobacco 501  Ref. 200005944
sand 336  Ref. 200005946

Reference
white 335  Ref. 200005948
steel grey 431  Ref. 200005927
indigo blue 140  Ref. 200005929
sky grey 354  Ref. 200005931
wineless 503  Ref. 200005933
sepia 133  Ref. 200005945
cream 407  Ref. 200005947

It's a terrific product, which I highly recommend.

*TIP:

 I would say at this point, about layering........ I did read somewhere of someone using vast numbers of layers on this surface, but I personally rarely use more than 4 or so layers, I don't see the point, seems such a waste of pastel!  Degas would use layers, but the layers allowed previous marks to show through and add vitality to the colour;  too many layers will defeat the purpose and may even deaden the colour.  My advice would be.......if you find yourself using multiple layers in order to HIDE previous incorrect tones or colours or shapes -STOP- simply take a stiff brush and brush off the offending area, and repaint it!