Fur In The Paint

We had visited our neighbor last night, and on our way out she offered to let me take some peonies home. They had been storm battered and wouldn’t last much longer anyway, so I plucked one. (Yes only one, I had to remind myself it was not proper etiquette to scamper willy-nilly about the yard, gathering them up by the dozens.) This morning I awoke to find it had opened up into this lovely flower, and I couldn’t resist taking a few photos. The darker ones are from my garden. (In this instance the word garden is used in the loosest possible way.)

Now the number of flower paintings that I have created in my lifetime, can probably (meaning that’s all I can remember) be counted on one hand. (Yup, that many.) But for some reason I can’t quite stop myself from taking lots and lots of pictures. Hmmm. The inner workings of a critter artist’s mind. Maybe it has something to do with my complete adoration of Georgia O’keefe.

Back to the Lighting.
Anywho, good lighting can make the difference between an ordinary photograph (and thus generally an ordinary painting) and a stunning piece. Good lighting can bring much needed contrast between shadow and highlight. Most of the time when I am photographing critters, I have to take what lighting there is. But for this I get to play around a bit.

The first photo (above) is just using the overhead light as well as the natural light from the window. It offers an okay amount of contrast. It would probably give me enough information to make a passably good painting. (If I were so inclined, and if I used loads of artistic juju to bump up the contrast while in the process of painting.)

The second photo is the flower lit using a natural spectrum light bulb from my drafting table, as well as overhead and natural sunlight from the window. I placed the lamp at a 45 degree angle from the windows. It not only added contrast, but also a myriad of soft and subtle hues of pink, yellow and blue. Lovely! (Plus, it will require much less of the juju to make a great painting.)

Had I been really feeling the flower power, I would have spritzed it gently with a water bottle, to mimic dew. It’s almost enough to make a critter artist think about painting peonies. Or maybe I am just drunk on the sweet smell of flowers that is currently permeating the gallery.

From Concept to Creation
This oil pastel, is as of yet, un-named. I am considering a couple of things, but nothing is firm. The size is currently 16×23.

I don’t think I realized just how much my artwork was influenced by compositional elements, until I started my artist journal, followed by the magazine articles and now the blog. I have always been sort of a visceral artist. I never really devoted great deals of thought, about how and why I do what I do. But since I have been keeping a constant written commentary about my artwork and how it’s created, I have really learned a lot about myself and my work.

Composition
It is the simple looking portraits that rely heavily on composition to make them interesting. It becomes about form and line, pattern and negative space.

The real desire for doing this painting was (as always) the horse. I love him. He is part of a matched team of Percherons that I had seen at two different events last summer. This guy in particular is stunning. I followed him around like a groupie, madly snapping pictures. His expressive eye and head shape are simply gorgeous. The reference photos below, are from both events. These are my main photo references for this painting. But I have around 20 others on my drafting table to look at for various reasons. Including another team that I photographed 15 some odd years ago, at a pull in South Dakota.

I could say putting him in front of a steel trailer, was totally a commentary on the draft horse’s usefulness in todays society, as most drafts aren’t really workers anymore. But in truth, I liked the compositional elements of the geometric shapes, set against his soft curves. I chose a roached mane (shaved close to the neck) because it strengthened the vision of that iconic working horse. And I will put him against the steel trailer (actually, it is probably aluminum) because of the symbolism it represents.

Subtle Differences
I spent around 20 hours draw time on him. This would seem to me a good argument for projecting. That being said, I made several small changes that I would not have been able to do, unless I had the ability to draw what I see. So please, learn to draw first, then project when necessary.

Most of the draw time was spent on the harness, which always takes a huge amount of time to get right. Also, I changed my mind in-process and had to re-draw the collar area. At first, my drawing didn’t have the reins draped over the hames of the collar. I thought it made the image too complex. But once I decided to removed the bridle and to roach the mane, suddenly it needed them there to add interest. I also changed the harness from a modern BioThane to a leather. I just love a horse that looks like it works for a living.

Quick Tip
I cannot draw a horse facing left, from a photo of a horse facing right. A person who is more photoshop loving than I, could just scan it in, flip the image, print it out and tah da! But being more lazy than that, I just held the photo face up to my table light, and drew from the ghost image on the back. All I really needed was the basic shapes. I have used my lamps to reverse the image many times. Extremely quick and quite effective.

So here’s the latest on my work in progress (WIP) on Catch’s portrait. I am totally loving working with watercolor pencils again. But it is really kinda of hard on my hands. The callus that was on my index finger from years of being a pencil artist, has all but disappeared in the past two years of working in oil pastel. Maybe it’s because I am getting older and my joints can’t take the stress like before. Or maybe it is just because I am going at it full tilt, and working 4-7 hours at a whack every day, (having too way much fun to stop.) But my hands are all achy and crampy. Sigh.

Anyway, here’s the worst bit. So I go and stand by my husband who is working on the computer, and say something similar to the above paragraph, but with a whining intonation. He briefly glances at me. I hold up my hand in a claw-like gesture like I’m some B-movie villian, to impress upon him the severity of my condition. Mike, never one to pander to my whining, rolls his eyes, looks back to the computer and says “Well babe, there’s a reason you switched to oil pastels.” Humph! Maybe I’ll go talk to the cat.

I thought I would do a detailed, step by step on doing horse hair using watercolor pencils. This painting is being done on Arches 140# hot press watercolor paper. If anyone has any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.

Here, I applied the base colors dry. I tend to scribble with little thought, other than following the directions that the hairs run.

Colors used: Chocolate, Dark Blue, Indigo Blue and Violet/Wine

Note: The colors mentioned are descriptive names, NOT the actual names on the pencils. Why did I do it this way? Well heres an example, Sanguine. . . what the heck color is Sanguine? (It’s a ginger/pumpkin color for those who are curious.) Also, I usually use multiple shades (2 or 3) of each color listed.

Here, I added water and blended out the color. I tend to use small brushes (For this, I used a #5 round.) I prefer to use cheap brushes, as the scrushing action (not a real technical term) of lifting the pencil into a liquid paint, tends to ruin the brushes.

I select the area to work in by following the muscle shapes or shiny coat lines. I do this, so if there are any heavy lines of pigmentation around the edges, they work with you in laying in a denser color for the shadows. In this instance, I worked the main neck muscle up to the shoulder line.

I wet a small area at a time, working quickly, so there is a minimum of hard edges. Again, try to follow the hair growth. It will look a little patchy. But because multiple layers will be applied, how it looks at this stage is kinda irrelavent.

Note: You could use a larger brush. Just be aware that this will put down more water. You may want to consider using heavier papers or stretching your lighter weight papers if buckling becomes a problem.

After the paper has dried (approximately 1-2 minutes) I add the second layer, again following the direction of the hair.

Colors Used: Chocolate, Purple, Terra Cotta, Indigo, and (very limitedly) Black.

Then apply water wash as before.

Hair effects are created by scraping a sharpened pencil through the existing layers of color, while the paper is still wet. I generally don’t do this over the entire painting. On this painting, I will only use this technique for the extreme highlights on the face and crest of the neck, as this is where I want my attention to be. Most of the neck will be done with a dry pencil.

Here, along the crest (top of neck) the scrape marks are freshly done. While the scrape marks in the area of the neck have had additional color applied, with a dry pencil for more subtle blending.

Note: If your paper dries before you finish with scraping in hair, just re-wet the paper using your brush. A Q-tip also works well to wet, as well as to lift off areas of intense color.

The neck area is now half done. All of this work was done dry. I burnish in color until the paper no longer accepts more. Then if necessary, I go in and wet the paper again. This will allow me to continue to add more layers of color.

Colors Used in Shadow Area: Chocolate, Purple, Terra Cotta, and Indigo.
Colors Used In Highlights: Cinnamon, Ginger, Periwinkle and Light Blue.

This is pretty close to being completed here. I say pretty close because as I work, I tend to go back in and adjust coloring to fit the rest of the painting. Nothing is really considered completed until I have signed the painting.

Watercolor pencils look pretty much like colored pencils. The main difference being the water-soluble nature of the lead. They can, in theory, be used multiple ways. I say in theory because I have only found the first three ways as being really useful. I’ve included the others because in certain situations, they may be the way to go.

• Use them like colored pencils
• Color or draw, then add water for watercolor effect. (My primary way of working.)
• wet brush, then lift color off the pencil. (Occasionally, I do this, especially for putting in long hairs or signing my name.)
• wet pencil then draw. (I use this for putting in white highlights, such as in the eye.)
• wet paper then draw. (Not recommended for most situations. This puts far too much pigment down, and will hinder any blending.)
• Color on separate paper, then lift color with wet brush. (Never tried it.)

Watercolor paper
I thought I would take a moment to mention watercolor paper, as it goes hand in hand with watercolor pencils.

There are three types (surfaces) in watercolor paper, and what I use exclusively with watercolor pencils is Hot Press. The smooth surface allows for smooth blending and getting in all the little hairs. The rougher texture tends to grab more pigment off the pencil and deposit it in the divets on the paper. I could see this being a fun effect for some, but I am a woman who is set in my ways. Hot Press only for me.

• Hot Press. This is the smoothest texture
• Cold Press. This has more texture and is quite commonly used by watercolorists.
• Rough. This has the most texture with a very dimensional surface.

Watercolor paper also comes in varying weights. I have not experimented with a lot of different weights. Since I tend to work my pencils quite dry, I generally use #140 weight. Papers can vary between 90# to 300# and more.

I would suggest using a heavier weight paper if you are fond of using a lot of water, or if your finished pieces are buckling. Another option would be to stretch your lighter weight paper while painting, by taping or stapling it to a board. This will allow the paper to dry flat.

Faber Castell <-----> Derwent Rexell

Watercolor Pencils: What I Use
I have primarily two brands that I use. Rexel Derwent and Faber Castell. I haven’t been working with watercolor pencils for some time now, so I am sure there are loads of new high quality pencils on the market. Since these two brands are the ones I have the most experience with, they will be the topic of this post.

If anyone out there has any brands that they prefer, I would love to hear about them and why you like them.

Rexel Derwent
This was the first set I bought myself. They are a mid-range brand of professional pencil. Personally, I feel the colors are a little more flat looking compared to the Faber Castells. Other than that, I really like these pencils.

Derwent has recently added a new line of watercolor pencils called Signature. They are all made to the highest standards and all have the highest lightfast rating possible. There are only 40 colors available currently. If I continue to work regularly in watercolor pencil again, I will definitely be getting a set.

• Common in most art supply stores, so they are easy to get open stock replacement pencils.
• Dense lead offers a fine point with minimal breakage
• Pencil can be sharpened with most standard pencil sharpeners. (Note: Faber Castell have a bigger barrel and require a larger sharpener.)
• Large assortment of colors. (72)
• You can download a lightfastness chart off their website
• hexagonal shape minimizes rolling.

Faber Castell
My favorite brand because of their luminous color. They are a little more spendy than most, but they are of the highest quality. And the way I see it is, you get what you pay for.

• Dense high quality pigment with the lightfast indicator on each pencil.
• Extensive color range (120 colors)
• Large hexagonal shape keeps them from constantly rolling off my drafting table.
• Lead is SV bonded, meaning the color is glued to the wood the full length of the pencil. for added strength and less breakage. (Note: These are still more prone to breakage than my Rexel Derwent pencils.)
• All non-toxic and acid free (ph neutral.)

About Lightfastness
Both of these brands are tested for lightfastness using the Blue Wool (BW) Scale. The highest BW value is 8. Values of BW6 or higher are considered lightfast.

The Faber Castell system uses a star rating. This is printed on each pencil so you can tell at a glance just how lightfast the color is.

***maximum light fastness BW7,BW8 (100+ years)
**very good light fastness BW5,BW6 (25+ years)
*good light fastness BW3,BW4 (5+ years)

Again, to see Derwent lightfastness ratings for their pencils, you must visit their website.

This month in the gallery, it has been uncharacteristically busy for a February. This is a good thing. (A really good thing.) But it has left me very little time for painting. I did manage to finish up my Earthmovers painting today. Whoohoo! I will post it, just a soon as it gets scanned for the print making process.

Last week, I had some small snippets of time in which I wanted to create. But, I was pretty sure I wouldn’t have enough time to offer my full attention to the Earthmovers piece. So I decided to do a small, brightly colored painting of Budda. My creativity muse was seemingly out sick that day. So I decided to try something that I had been planning on doing for years, but just never got around to trying. That is, taking some photos and playing around with them in Photoshop.

Original Photo
This first photo is an untouched image.

The following photos only had minor adjustments. It wasn’t so much that I wanted something to copy. As it was, a desire to spark a new way of looking at the image.

Increased Saturation
When I printed this out, I thought…”Well thats interesting, but it really doesn’t do me any good.” And I tossed it aside.

The next day I had my art group, so I took the painting along with me to work on, while we all sat around and talked. I also took the original photos (not the Photoshop’d versions) for my reference. It wasn’t until I got home that, (to my complete surprise) I noticed how much my finished painting resembled the color saturated image. Apparently on some level, I had soaked it in. (osmosis perhaps?)

Posterised
I don’t think I used this posterised image at all. (not even by osmosis.) But I included it, as one of the two adjustments that I did. I really like the look that posterising creates and may try it again on another project.

Cropped and Rotated
This photo has not been digitally manipulated and was my main reference image. It was cropped and the image was rotated by about 45 degrees. (I did this by hand, by laying strips of white paper over the photo until I got a composition that I liked. No computers necessary.) I really wanted to keep it a small, easy, and fun painting. So I elimated all the extras in the background and simplified the whole thing with cropping.

Bright Eyes - Oil Pastel 8×8
Copyright by Mona Majorowicz

Finished Painting
It is quite a bit darker here than in real life. But you get the idea. The painting’s greens. blues and purples are quite vibrant, and is actually what makes the painting. This isn’t great art. But it was a good way to loosen up a bit and have fun with color.

I was recently reading one of my favorite blogs. Maggie Stiefvater has both wonderful artwork, as well as a great writing style. One of her recent posts was about complementary colors. This got me to thinking of what complementary colors I use in my work.

Periwinkle is my all time favorite color for painting. (It doesn’t really appear anywhere else in my life.) Nearly every painting I do has periwinkle in it. I almost always couple it with ginger. The two complementary colors just pop when placed together. I actually purchase more periwinkle and ginger pastels, than I do blacks or whites.

The three paintings I have shown here are all recent examples of paintings where I utilize these complements in greater and lesser degrees. On the oil pastel tiger painting called Making Waves, the gingers are obvious, but the periwinkle is subtle. The black stripes are mostly a deep purple with periwinkle hightlights.

On this oil pastel painting of the Belgian draft horse team called Days End, much of the shadow area is done in a wine color mixed with purple. Nearly all the highlights on the flynet and tack are periwinkle.

And with the mare and foal oil pastel painting called Devotion, yet again periwinkle colors are used instead of all grays for the nose and eye areas. The lavendar color adds a softness which lessens the harshness of the grays.

I am not sure how I got to the point of loving this color combination. It just sort of happened. My techniques develop almost organically, without a lot of directed thought. I think that is why I am a self-taught artist. It is all about the exploration and discovery.

Oil Pastel Tips

• Have a plan. As I have mentioned before, I draw everything out in advance. The pastels stain my substrate and so it is problematic to scrape off a color that is wrong and replace it with another color of similar values or lighter. Another way to deal with this is to use lighter colors first. When you apply darker colors over light, you can scrape away all of the pastel and have minimal staining.
• For smoother blending, it is best to work consistently. If you leave the painting alone for as little as 15 minutes the pastel “sets up” and makes a rough edge. rubbing your finger lightly over the painting or warming the pastel a bit in your hand will help when going back in to work an older area.
• Letting the pastel “set up” can be an advantage when you want to put a strong color or highlight over the already existing painting. Often I will let a painting set over night before I put my whitest whites in, over the top of another color.
• Be aware of your lighting situation. Oil pastels will glow under the desk lamps. I think this is because the underlying board is reflecting light through the pastels. However when you put the painting under normal room lighting it may well look dark. I have had this happen several times. Under the table lights it is luminous (insert angelic chorus here.) Then when I hang it on the wall, it is flat and lifeless. So disappointing. How I handle this is by working with my table lamps off. I try to work under the normal lighting conditions that it will be viewed in. This also means I don’t paint much at night anymore, either.
• Clean up. As mentioned before, oil pastels are messy. They develop little booger like tags which roll all over and smear. The floor under my drafting table is all speckled and nasty. About every 2 months (it really should be done much more often) I take some dish soap and scrub like the dickens. Goo Gone also works well. Or, if I were a wiser person I would lay down some paper which could be picked up and tossed.

Tools For Working With Oil Pastels

• Gloves. Disposable gloves are a blessing. Oil pastels are quite messy and greasy. If you don’t want to be constantly washing your hands, I highly recommend getting gloves. I change my gloves regularly as well to avoid tracking on my painting. I go through 10-20 in an afternoon.
• Turpenoids. I personally don’t use them other than for cleaning up. However they are great if you want to use a paint brush with your pastels. Also you can smudge and soften using a rag and a little turpenoid.
• Paper Towels. I use paper towels to wipe the tips of my pastels. This helps to prevent cross contamination of colors.



• Ceramic Tools. These are great for scraping out a large area or removing just tiny little bits. They have a pointed blade on one side and a curved almost spoon like hook on the other.



• Color Shapers. I have color shapers that come in various sizes, shapes, points and firmness’. You an get them at most of the same places as oil pastels. They are good for smoothing rough edges, minor blending and cleaning up the little tags of oil pastel that are on the surface of the painting.

These of course aren’t all of the possible tools you could use. These are just the one I use regularly and consistently. Go experiment and have fun.

I thought I would address how to paint hair (in this case a horse’s coat) with oil pastels. I plan to also blog about doing horse hair in water soluble pencil in the near future. I tend to work with oil pastels in a more impressionistic way, than I do in water soluble pencils. So creating a fur coat is less about putting in every little hair and more about directing line and color to achieve the visual effect of hair. I took a few WIP (work in progress) shots of my current painting for illustration. (I apologize for the lousy dark photos. I am still new to using Mike’s digital camera.) Since I am a sectional painter, (meaning, I like to work on one small area at a time and finish it, before moving on) the photos are of a small section of the whole painting.

To begin with, I need to have a fairly comprehensive drawing. Oil pastels stain my substrate (which is 100% cotton rag museum board) so I need to have a good idea of what I am placing where, to avoid complications from having the wrong color in the wrong place. It is possible to scrape off a certain amount of color, but in general it wouldn’t work to have too great a color shift. The underlying stain would show through any similar value color as well as anything lighter, placed over the top.

Also, I don’t use turpenoids for blending. You get can get some great effects with turps. Like subtle blending or for painting with a brush. However, I love the mark making that using the straight oil pastel gives. I rely on laying color next to color to achieve my goals. Nearly all of my blending is done with the pastels themselves.

First Thing: I do is lay in my darks. In this case, black and darkest grays. Though it has a random scribbley look to it. I lay my lines in the direction that the horse’s hair coat runs.

Step Two: I add the mid-tone ranges of grays. I also add the periwinkle and ginger colors now. (one of my favorite color combinations) In this applications the gingers add warmth and the periwinkle provides pop.

Step Three: This is where I put in the lightest grays, creams and sparingly … white. White, much like black, when used in excess can make a painting look flat and lifeless. However when used properly, you can achieve great contrast and highlights. Some blending and overlay is good. Too much though and you’ll have mud.

Lastly: Go back in and do whatever needs to be done. Often this is re-establishing the darks, if they get blended out too much. In this painting I added royal purple in my darks to again add zing. Also, there are always little bits of board showing through where I didn’t get the colors completely blended. So I rub these out using a shaping tool or my finger. Then I move onto the next section.

I have been working with oil pastels for a couple of years now. At this point, a lot of what I do is almost done without thought. Working quickly, I just let the creative energy flow through me while I put in colors. Then at some point I just realize that it is done. It looks like it is supposed too. Anyway, that is how it is supposed to happen (when the stars are aligned and all is right in the heavens.) Sometimes, I can work it and work it and it still doesn’t come out right. Then, the wisest course of action is to either stop for awhile or move on to a completely new area. That is what I did with this painting. The left hand dark horse hasn’t worked out the way I envisioned it. So, I moved on to the gray horses. Now that I am happy with them, I feel more confident to go back in and rework the dark horse.

In the next few days, I will cover oil pastels further. What they are, where you can get them and offer some tips for using them.