Landscape painting in pastel a demonstration in the art of landscape painting in pastel
I was driving down a country lane one day and noticed this old dilapidated farmhouse in the distance and I thought I would like to paint it because of its old and broken down look but it was a bit too far away and I couldn't get any nearer without trespassing on the farmer's field. Here is where a bit of creativity comes in, although the picture was taken from far away it shouldn't stop you from painting the subject as long as you know what should be there in the subject like colours and shapes.
This is the photograph that I am going to paint from and we can take as our centre of interest the old farmhouse which is off centre in the photograph. I am going to add the old sheds which are on both sides of the farmhouse and add the field and fence in the foreground, I'm also discarding the houses in the distance in this painting.
I first need to draw out a rough sketch of the main areas that I want from the photograph and here I have started to draw the farmhouse slightly off the centre of the paper. You never want to draw your centre of interest exactly in the middle of the paper, always have it just off centre either to the left or to the right. Look at your photograph and sketch the lines in that you want on your paper to make a good composition, please see composition to learn more about composition. The lines I am drawing in are only basic lines to guide us through the painting, sometimes I don't even bother with a basic drawing I might just jump straight in with pastel it all depends how confident you are as an artist.
Once we have drawn in the basic pencil lines to indicate our composition I now start using the pastel to put in a basic colour on the roof of the farmhouse using a dark burnt umber and I use this for all the darks in the painting.
Here I have blocked in the tone of the chimneys with burnt umber and I have also started to paint in a basic colour of yellow ochre for the side of the farmhouse which is in the light, these are all basic colours to cover all of the paper up and to get us started in the painting.
The burnt umber in the chimneys have been painted over with a cerulean blue to achieve a dark blue colour and a medium burnt umber has been added to the front of the house. I have also started to put in lights on the roof where I think highlights will be later.
A medium cerulean blue has been added to the roof and over the burnt umber which was painted in on the front of the farmhouse to make this cooler. The windows and window frames have only been suggested at this point.
Here I am starting to paint in the light sky colour with a light blue and which will contrast nicely against the darks of the chimneys.
All the sky area has been painted in now which will be painted over and softened with greys later, the sheds have been broadly painted in with the side of the pastel using a blue grey.
