I was asked to create a painting for a wedding present of this beautiful period house called The Argory which is just outside Moy in Co Tyrone. I grew up close to this National Trust property and have always loved visiting it’s beautiful grounds with the dogs. I went on a really sunny late afternoon to photograph for the painting. I ended up using the sky from one photo and the view from another.
It’s always lovely to be asked to produce such a memorable gift for someone, and in this case even more so as our families have been friends for many years. I hope this piece marks the start of a new chapter for them and that they enjoy the painting for many years.
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| The finished painting, pastel on velour 20″x 13″ |
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| My line sketch on the velour. |
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| Working from furtherest away to the foreground I start with the blue gradient of the sky. This was built up using about 3 shades of Unison blue pastels. I love their softness but they do stick well to the velour by rubbing in these lower layers. |
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| You can see from this how I’ve added the purple grey tones first marking in the shapes of the clouds. The beauty of pastels is how easily blended they are. I can soften the edges of the clouds with my fingers as it will blend into the blue I’ve applied underneath. |
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| I keep adding thin layers and blending until the clouds get smoother and the gradients within them more subtle. |
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| I’m tempted to work this area below the horizon all at once adding in all my darkest tones all over but I just can’t help working in this left to right fashion. I know that I can rest my hand and not worry about leaning on worked areas. It’s not the classically taught method, but in my opinion it’s the end product that matters most and I like working this way. I would use the other method if I was painting plein air though. I would have to work quicker to capture the light so it would be important to judge the picture as a whole. In this case I’ve already captured the light I wanted in my photos. It’s how I transpose that into pastel that makes it a painting. |
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| The contrast is high in the photo so I can really go for deep dark shadows and vibrant highlights. |
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| Although I’ve used mostly Unison soft pastels I’ve also used a Faber Castel black stick for the darkest value. I also used some dark pastel pencils for the very small fine lines on the building. |
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| Working the whole back row of trees. I’ve used about 6 or 7 shades of green only although it’s one colour you’ll want to have lots of if you’re interested in painting landscapes, especially here in Ireland! |
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| The building is quite small in the composition and there is a lot of detail in the stonework. The best I can do is hint at it! I use pastel pencil to mark in the darkest shadows first. |
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| You can see here a Grey28 Unison pastel which has been worn down when I used it on it’s side. Using the different sides of pastels creates good edges for detail. I’ve exhausted every sharp edge I have doing this building! But I can easily create more without wasting any pastels. |
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| Working the foreground now with that dappled light. |
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| Almost there! The final highlights to some of the speckles of light. |
Hope you’ve enjoyed the progress. Check out my website for info on how to go about commissioning a painting of a loved one, pet or even a favourite view. www.EmmaColbertArt.com
Enjoyed seeing your progress and grateful for your explanations. This is a wonderful piece. I just started using some Unisons and just love the buttery feel to them on the velour paper. But I've only been brave enough to use them on backgrounds as their so soft. Well done Emma!
Thanks Marianne! I love their softness and although that can be a dangerous quality on velour I've never had any fall off that left damage to the painting which has happened previously with Senneliers…I find them beyond the boundary of soft. I use different strengths of mark with them from thin layers which I blend in, to heavy handed marks which give vibrant colour and stick better because of the force with which they are applied. Hope that makes sense, velour is so tricky and it's interesting hearing how other artists deal with it! What do you use as your main pastel?
Hi Emma – This is a great project to see. I'm smack in the middle of a landscape that has big puffy clouds so I love seeing how you do this with Unisons! 🙂 Thank you for sharing your work with us.
Thanks Sherry! I find clouds quite difficult but pastel is definitely the ultimate medium to tackle them in! Good luck with yours and thanks for visiting the blog! 🙂
This is realy amazing 🙂