Category Archives: Pastel Painting
Q: What is it that you most fear hearing about your work?
Studio
A: I’d say that the worst thing is when there is no reaction at all. I want people to engage with my work – like it or don’t like it – but say and feel SOMETHING. When there is no response, that means my work has failed to communicate anything and I have failed in my duty as an artist. Art is all about communication.
Comments are welcome!
Q: Would you please share a few more of your pastel portraits?
“Sam and Bobo,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 36″ x 31″, 1989
“Jules,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 28″ x 22″, 1989
“The Post Oak Jacks,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 31″ x 39″, 1990
“Reunion,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 38″ x 58″, 1990
A: See the four above. As in my previous post, I reshot photographs from my portfolio book so the colors above have faded. Many years later, however, my originals are as vibrant as ever.
“Reunion” (bottom) is the last commissioned portrait I ever made. Early on I knew that portraiture was too restrictive and that I wanted my work to evolve in a completely different direction. However, I didn’t know yet what that direction would be.
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Q: Can we see some of your early potraits?
“Krystyn,” charcoal, 22″ x 30″, 1989
“John,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 22″ x 28″, 1989
A: The reproductions above are two of my earliest. The portrait of Bryan (see last week’s post) is hanging at the school that was named for him, Dr. Bryan C. Jack Elementary School, in Tyler, Texas. Krystyn’s portrait is hanging in my dining room in Alexandria, VA – I liked it too much to part with it. I have no idea where the one of John is now.
Note that the actual paintings are more vibrant than the 8 x 10’s shown above. For example, the background of John’s painting is a brilliant green. To obtain the images above I re-photographed photos from my portfolio book. These photos, unlike the originals, have faded over the years. That’s one more reason that my originals need to be seen in person.
Comments are welcome!
Q: You have sometimes spoken about your early work as a portrait artist. When and why did you start making portraits? Do you still do them?
“Bryan,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 22″ x 28″, 1988
A: In 1989 I was a Naval officer working at the Pentagon and I hated my job as a computer analyst. Although it was terrifying to leave the security of a paycheck for the uncertainty of an artist’s existence, I made the leap. In retrospect it was one of the best decisions of my life. When I resigned from active duty (I remained in the Navy Reserve, which provided a part-time job and a small income; in 2003 I retired as a Navy Commander), I needed a way to make a living.
Prior to this career change, I worked hard to develop my portrait skills. I volunteered to run a life drawing class at The Art League School in Alexandria, VA, where I made hundreds of figure drawings using charcoal and pastel. I spent a semester commuting between Washington, DC and New York to study artistic anatomy at the New York Academy of Art. I spent another semester studying gross anatomy with medical students at Georgetown University Medical School. So I was well prepared to devote myself to making portraits.
For a time I made a living making commissioned photo-realist portraits in soft pastel on sandpaper. However, after about two years I became bored. I remember thinking, “I did not leave a boring job just to make boring art!” Furthermore, I had no interest in doing commissions because what I wanted to accomplish as an artist did not coincide with what portrait clients wanted. I completed my final portrait commission in 1990 and never looked back. To this day I remain loathe to do a commission of any kind.
Comments are welcome!
Q: Your pastel-on-sandpaper paintings are very labor intensive. Do you typically have just one in progress at any given time?
Works in progress, soft pastel on sandpaper, 58″ x 38″
A: For many years I always worked on one at a time because I have only one or two ideas – never more than that – about what I will make next. Also, I believe that “all art is the result of one’s having gone through an experience to the end.” (It’s on a note taped to the wall near my easel). So I would work on one painting at a time until all of the problems in it were resolved. Each piece that I undertake represents an investment of several months of my life and after nearly three decades as an artist, I know that once I start a piece I will not abandon it for any reason. When it is the best painting that I can make – when adding or subtracting anything would be a diminishment – I pronounce it “finished.” In the past I would start the next one only when the completed piece was out of my sight and at the frame shop.
But a few years ago I began working on two pastel paintings at a time. When I get stuck – or just need a break from looking at the same image day after day (I am in my studio 5 days a week) – I switch to the other one. This helps me work more efficiently. The two paintings interact with each other; they play off of each other and one suggests solutions that help me to resolve problem areas in the other. I’m not sure exactly how this happens – maybe putting a piece aside for awhile alerts my unconscious to begin working deeply on it – but having two in progress at the same time is my preferred way of working now.
A note about the painting on the left above, which was previously called, “Judas.” I happen to be reading “Cloud Atlas,” by David Mitchell and came across the word “judasing” used as a verb meaning, “doing some evil to a person who profoundly trusted you.” I’d never heard the word before, but it resonated with an event in my personal life. So the new title of my painting is “Judasing.” This is a good reminder that work and life are inextricably (and inexplicably) woven together and that titles can come from anywhere!
Comments are welcome!
Q: How do you remove pastel dust from your clothing, fingers, etc.?
Pastel dust
A: Pastel usually comes out of my clothes easily in the laundry, unless I have had an intense studio session where I let it make a total mess. I try not to wear good clothes to the studio. Getting it off my hands is easy with Artguard, a barrier cream I always apply before working. A good scrub with soap and water washes the pastel right off.
The worst occupational hazard, believe it or not, is what happens to the tops of my shoes! As I work, the dust falls onto my feet and I usually don’t notice until the end of the day. Whether made of canvas, leather, or whatever, shoes can be a problem when it comes to removing the dust.
Comments are welcome!
Pearls from artists* # 48
“Big Deal,” with double portrait of the author
* an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on.
Until the invention of photography, the painted (or sculptural) portrait was the only means of recording and presenting the likeness of a person. Photography took over this role from painting and at the same time raised our standards for judging how much an informative likeness should include.
This is not to say that photographs are in all ways superior to painted portraits. They are more informative, more psychologically revealing, and in general more accurate. But they are less tensely unified. Unity in a work of art is achieved as a result of the limitations of the medium. Every element has to be transformed in order to have its proper place within these limitations. In photography the transformation is to a considerable extent mechanical. In a painting each transformation is largely the result of a conscious decision by the artist. Thus the unity of a painting is permeated by a far higher degree of intention. The total effect of a painting (as distinct from its truthfulness) is less arbitrary than that of a photograph; its construction is more intensely socialized because it is dependent on a greater number of human decisions. A photographic portrait may be more revealing and accurate about the likeness and character of the sitter; but it is likely to be less persuasive, less (in the very strict sense of the word) conclusive. For example, if the portraitist’s intention is to flatter or idealize, he will be able to do so far more convincingly in a painting than with a photograph.
Geoff Dyer, editor, Selected Essays: John Berger
Comments are welcome!
Q: Have you ever worked outside?
Reproductions of “Cardinal Rule” (top) and “Blue Ego,” originals are soft pastel on sandpaper, 30″ x 38″
A: As a pastel artist I’ve never worked outside – with so many pastels, it’s just not practical – but early on in the “Domestic Threats” series, I created two outdoor setups. Works in the series derived from elaborate scenes that I arranged and then photographed.
I used to take long walks along the Potomac River in Alexandria, VA, and there was a tree stump that was fascinating. It was mostly twisted roots, knotty branches, dark hidden spaces, etc. (top painting in photo). One morning I took several hand puppets and stuffed animals (my subject matter at the time) and carefully arranged them on the tree. Around me people were busy exercising their dogs. Soon I attracted quite a bit of attention – a tall blonde woman playing with puppets on a tree stump! Dogs came over to sniff. Their owners came over, too, and I was pressed into explaining, again and again, that I was an artist, that I was photographing this scene so I could paint it, etc. The interruptions were very annoying.
The second time I tried an outdoor setup was again along the Potomac River, but this time I selected a secluded strip of beach where I was undisturbed. I had forgotten to consider the light and inadvertently chose a cloudy day. I remember being disappointed that the light was flat and lacking shadows. The painting (bottom in photo) turned out to be one of my least favorites.
I resolved from then on to focus on interiors. Alfred Hitchcock famously used rear projection so that he could work in a studio rather than on location. One reason, he said, was that in a studio he had total control. I know what he meant. When I set up an interior scene and position the lights to make interesting shadows, indeed, I have control over the whole look. No aspect is left to chance. The accidents – improvements! – happen later when I work on the painting.
Comments are welcome!
Q: What’s on the easel today?
Work in progress
A: I’m continuing work on “Judas,” a piece I started some weeks ago. A second in-progress pastel-on-sandpaper painting is on the right in the photo above.
Comments are welcome!
Q: How do you decide on the titles for your pastel paintings?
“Stigmata,” soft pastel on sandpaper, 28″ x 48″
A: Usually a title suggests itself over the course of the months I spend on a painting. Sometimes it comes from a book I’m reading, from a piece of music, a film, bits of overheard conversation. A title can come from anywhere, but finding the best one is key. I like what Jean Cocteau says about this:
One title alone exists. It will be, so it is. Time conceals it from me. How discover it, concealed by a hundred others? I have to avoid the this, the that. Avoid the image. Avoid the descriptive and the undescriptive. Avoid the exact meaning and the inexact. The soft, the hard. Neither long nor short. Right to catch the eye, the ear, the mind. Simple to read and to remember. I had announced several. I had to repeat them twice and the journalists still got them wrong. My real title defies me. It enjoys its hiding place, like a child one keeps calling, and whom one believes drowned in the pond.
Once I have the best title, I make sure it fits the painting exactly. How I do that is difficult to explain. It’s an intuitive process that involves adjusting colors, shapes, and images so that they fit the painting’s meaning, i.e., the meaning hinted at by the title.
Comments are welcome!
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