The Smells of Nature and A Piece of Sand Paper.

"Summer Morning Tahoe Basin", 12 x 16, Pastel on Canson Paper

I love the wilderness. I love lands unencumbered by man made structures. I get a feeling of connectedness to my spirit within. I am at peace, I am joyful, I am exhilarated.  I love being there, the smells, the sounds of nature abound. I am at home. 

I try to paint these feelings into work ( if you call it work). In the creative process of this painting it came to me to try a technique I enjoy doing from time to time. In this case I took a small piece of sand paper and selected a pastel of a color I wanted to gently integrate into part of the painting. I stroked the pastel stick on the sand paper to get the loose fragments. Then I laid the painting on a table, took a watercolor brush and the sand paper and gently brushed these fragments onto the painting.

In this case I chose a warm peach/pink pastel to integrate into the piece. To fix it in place so the fragments wouldn't fall off when I lifted the painting, I very gently sprayed the fixative down onto it holding the spray can about a foot above it. I allowed it to dry for some minutes before putting the work back on the easel to continue on with the painting.