For me, the variety and spice of it really lies in the art mediums – the material I’m using to represent a subject. They each have an ability to highlight or express something different. Watercolour can be whimsical, bright and loose. Charcoal and graphite have a more serious, almost historic tone while still remaining soft and realistic. And chalk pastel feels traditional, rich and full of life. I’ve painted with oils and acrylics in the past but at this point in time I find I can’t get the same vibrant results, so for now I focus on the mediums I feel most comfortable with and that I know can achieve the desired results in a custom portrait.
It’s funny how we come to find the materials that work best for us. When I began my portrait business, I worked exclusively in colour pencil (or pencil crayon…I find colour pencil sounds a lil’ more grown up). This is most likely because I was first playing around with colour pencils while watching nature documentaries. A weird bird would pop up so I would pause the video and do a sketch. Colour pencils are compact, clean and easy to slowly layer. I was able to use this material I had piles of while still being able to get the colour variety and realism that I like to achieve…all while lounging in front of the tv. When my son was born I started doing little portraits of him in colour pencil as well and really liked the results. I like to be in control, and colour pencils are great for a type A personality. The build up is so slow you can really be finicky about every detail.
And that was what worked for me for several years. So why chalk pastel portraits? Once upon a time, in like 2021, while working at my gallery/framing job, a customer and I started talking about art supplies. He mentioned he was a retired art conservator and asked what medium I worked in. When I said colour pencil, he was surprised and mentioned that they are not very light fast. Luckily I was working in prismacolor, a high quality pencil, but they are still not as long lasting as other art mediums. He mentioned chalk pastel as being more archival and long lasting due to the pigment vs binder ratio which I can’t elaborate on any more than that…otherwise I would just be making it up. I had been feeling impatient with colour pencil at the time, so I took it as a sign to delve into a new art medium! Chalk pastel portraits came very intuitively to me. It was a perfect “blend” of painting and drawing. I could work in a sort of patchwork of colours, like how I would typically paint, but yet have the precision that I like with dry materials. The progress is faster and the results more profound. It all seems so obvious now. When your art is for others though, in a custom situation, it’s easy to get stuck in a reliable method. You need to churn out consistent results. I’m learning now though that with each new material, or method I try, I learn more and get better. I need to keep that flame fed and continuing to experiment and hone new skills seem to be the best fuel.
