Dry pastels

'Kindred Souls' 8x10 pastel ©Karen Margulis available for purchase $145 Sometimes I just don't feel like making a mess. Sometimes I want to do an underpainting but I don't want to take out my paints and brushes and I don't want to clean up. Sometimes I am using paper that can't get wet so doing a wet underpainting isn't an option. Yet I still would like to have the benefits of an underpainting. I like having some colors, values and interesting things happening on my paper to respond to. I…

These are demos from my Landgrove Inn Pastel Figure Drawing workshop in Vermont. It is a beautiful inn with wonderful ownders, food and great workshops. The portraits are about 20 minutes and the two figures are 3 minutes, the other 10 minutes. Add caption

In my painting journal lately 🤍 I am so excited because the maker of my handmade journal, Moneeza @lotusblubookart, will be joining me live on zoom shortly for a special workshop on bookbinding! 📚 This is part of The Curiosity Sessions in my membership! I bring in a guest for these special sessions - a creative, passionate soul who teaches us something new! I believe creativity is abundant. The more you use, the more you have! There are endless beautiful means of expression to explore…

I just pressed send on an email to subscribers. Each week I send out a Gentle Sunday note and this week I’ve been thinking about transitions. I’ve come to love the transition from one season into the next. What a gift that we don’t go to sleep one night at the height of summer and wake up to falling leaves and crisp weather the next day. We watch it unfold, slowly. If we’re paying attention we can appreciate the subtle changes each day, the anticipation, the tension even. There’s a ...

Two years ago, I had no idea how I could include dry pastels in my mixed-media art journaling. I thought that they are reserved for fine arts. I was pretty sure that dry pastels are challenging to work with, that they smudge and smear and require a lot of faffing around (fixing, having the right paper, smooth surface, and so on). And I knew I have to keep my daily art journaling practice simple for it to be consistent. But the beautiful problem was that one of my drawers was full of dry…