India. Pastel portrait 12" x 16". Layering and blending pastel technique on velour paper.
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Velour grabs pastel in a way that still surprises me, even after using it for years. The tooth holds so much pigment you can push into really rich darks without the paper fighting you, but it also means once a stroke is down it doesn't lift cleanly the way sanded paper does. Sounds like you leaned into that and worked the layering instead of trying to correct around it. The 12x16 size gives you enough room to really develop a face without losing yourself in tiny details for days.
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Thank you for your nice comments, Iris! I love working on velour paper. I have been working with pastel on velour since I was 12 years old. I was introduced to it by a portrait artist who came to our church to talk about art. I love the layers you can achieve with it, almost like oil glaze.
The big downside, it is so delicate! You donât want to drop it on its edge⊠your portrait disappears! đ
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Twelve years on velour and it still hasn't betrayed you, that's the real win. The fragility is brutal though, I can only imagine babying a portrait through that many layers.
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Thank you again for your thoughts and comments, Iris.
The technique I use here is my own process, developed over the years. I want to get the process recorded on video to preserve it and hopefully pass it on.
Throughout the entire drawing, I lay paper over the portrait so my hand never touches the velour or pastel. I work on a drawing board, not an easel. Itâs a very time-consuming process. Iâve worked up to a year on some portraits.
Framing the art is always a challenge. Framers donât want to put art right against the glass, but in this case it helps keep the pastel in place. I do give the final art a very light spray of fixative. I used to frame it with non-glare glass, which, along with the soft texture of the velour, gave the portrait a nice, velvety feel, almost as if there was no glass at all. I have not done that in years, though. Now I use UV-protective glass that reduces most of the glare.
I really should re-photograph this portrait. I shot it a while back with my phone camera, and it really doesnât show the portrait off to its best advantage.
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India is such a beautiful name for a portrait, and knowing it's pastel on velour makes me think about how intentional every mark had to be. Velour doesn't let you take anything back the way other surfaces do, so the layering you described sounds like you were building up to what you saw in her from the start. That kind of commitment to a surface and a subject at the same time says a lot about how you work.
Thank you so much for your thoughtful comments, Courtney. Your Knowledge and understanding as a fellow artist are greatly appreciated!
I really appreciate that, and I'm glad the detail about velour landed, it's such a specific choice and it shows.