Most of the time, when we are painting, we have a finished idea in our minds. A scene, a still life, a portrait, where our activities revolve around reaching the finished idea. In order to be successful, we have to plan a route to this final place, much like taking a road trip. First, we have to sketch, then we typically block in. Details and finessing follow until we arrive at our completed piece.
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| Edisto Hues, 27 x 40, pastel on archival paper. © 2013 Tom Weinkle |
The Poetry of Pastel works a little differently. To use the road trip metaphor, the idea is to get in the car with only a loose idea of where we want to go. Instead of taking the most direct route from point A to point B, we might "head in a general direction". The excitement of this approach is that we may see and experience things the more direct route would have avoided. It's true that we may get lost on the trip. On the other hand, we may delight in an otherwise missed opportunity.
When thinking about painting, what if we took the less traveled road? What if we set out with a general idea of where we wanted to go? What would that look like?
To answer the question, I've posted a recent work created using this technique. In the next post, we'll compare this work to a more planned work and see if we can tell the difference.
Let me know what you think.
