Time lapse movie, Passing Point

This piece practically painted itself, being that it was more loose than my usual tight style. I loved working on it and am happy to share with you the process of how I paint.

You may notice in these small productions that I wear some sort of mask on my face. Protecting my lungs from the airborne pastel dust is serious business. I've tried heavy ventilators and they don't fit my small featured face. I've tried 3M, and a few other disposable face masks, but it seemed like they were not protecting me enough. For my own health I searched high and low for a small, comfortable, and highly effective filter and found another pastel artist, Paula Ford using a Totobobo. Artist's are always at risk by their mediums, especially soft pastel dust! I wanted to bring this up because recently my favorite online blogger friend Loriann underwent lung surgery and so I wanted her to see that she too, can continue working in pastel! I still have to gently wipe up any remaining dust with a damp rag to keep from getting airborne. I'm not sponsored by Totbobo, but I certainly do encourage pastel artists to check them out for their own health.

Passing Point, 24x24

Passing Point, 24x24" Pastel on sanded paper ©2011 Brenda Boylan

By now all you lookieloos who peruse this blog know that I've been working on a bunch of city scenes for an upcoming show at Caswell Gallery. It is a subject that I have barely touched upon in my entire artistic career. I have found this series of work to be a little like a hide and seek game, finding bits of interesting urban scenes that were worth putting pastel to paper. Especially this week, as I was driving about, I took note of the bright lights on the cars and also how they reflected the road markings. These are things that I would have NEVER considered looking at before this series of work. My intent in this painting was to get the lights to glow so that they made my eyes water. The final (above) is a much larger version inspired by my last blog post that has quadrupled in size. My gosh, this was a fun one to paint. What have you recently noticed about your world around you?

Caswell Gallery

"Cityscapes"

Artist's Reception is Friday Feb 4th, 6~9:00pm

Feb 4th~28th, 2011

201 W. Columbia River Hwy.

Troutdale, OR.

Close up and cropped!

Passage Point, 6x6 and Deadlines!

Passage Point, 6x6" Pastel on sanded paper. ©2011 Brenda Boylan

Working on the urban scenes for the upcoming "Cityscapes" show at Caswell Gallery has me really inspired to do more of this subject. After I finished this little guy, I scanned it into Photoshop and zoomed in to get an accurate crop. I found that the enlarged image, albeit messy and out of focus, has given me good reason to paint this larger (say...maybe 24x24"?) with all it's messy and wonderfully loose marks. So different than my tight artistic hand a few years ago.

Here it is cropped.

Passage Point, 'cropped'

If I move forward on this idea, I'll have to work fast because I have a few deadlines to make. That will make it all the more freeing and fun! Do you work better under pressure? I have always thrived on it because of my past days as a graphic designer and all those stiff deadlines. What do deadlines mean to you?

Curbsides, 12x9"

Curbsides, 12x9", Pastel on sanded paper

© 2011, Brenda Boylan

Don't you just hate it when artists title their work "Untitled" or #4? A title is everything if you are going to be serious, so why not give your work some credibility? I read a great post by fellow pastelist Marla Baggetta on titling her work...read it here. She made me think more about my naming. Sometimes a title will pop out in my head even before I put pastel to paper. Other times things just don't click. I might find them in a discussion, a walk in the neighborhood, or in a song or poetry. This one has not come to me yet, but will come soon once the egg has hatched. Until then, happy painting!

Update: I finally came up with a title this morning..."Curbsides". Seems fitting.