Allison

Allison 3121, 2011
7.5x11 inches, soft pastel

After a night of thunderstorms I woke up to a beautiful sunny day, and the promise of a gorgeous long weekend.  Met at a local restaurant for coffee and breakfast with the ex, and back to the studio - all before 9 am.   Things are lookin' good!

Completed the above figure study in pastel after two weeks of fiddling with colour nuances.  It's amazing how much purple and orange are in skin.  The brain says we are 'skin coloured', but the eyes say 'whoa there, what about lavender here, pumpkin there, don't forget the carmine, and Oh!, you need a touch of vanilla on that spot right there!'

Bought a new pencil sharpener - heavy duty - worked for 2 days then started crushing and ripping apart the pastel pencils - will have to return it, sigh.  Back to the scalpel and shaving the pastels.... the old tried and true, but it feels so wrong to sharpen the pastel pencils on sandpaper, like I'm wasting all that colour.

I'm trying to get ready for a number of competitions, all before September.  Allison (above) is for a figure competition, also working on some other figure studies, an abstract, some coloured pencil, and some photography.

It's going to be a busy summer.  Time for more coffee, and then back to the studio.

Happy long weekend!

TTFN