Work in Progress

I’ve been diving a little more into the pastel world and have found them to be VERY. EXPENSIVE. Like, “woah, hang on- let me go sell my kidney first” expensive. (That might be a tad exaggerated, but the feeling behind it is the same.)

I completed a tiger a while back on Clairefontaine PastelMat and loooooooved it but the price of that paper cuts a little dear. Even though I have a whole pack of it, I also found some Canson Mi-Tientes that is a fraction of the price and thought I’d give it a go.

I’ve been working on this barn owl for a while and pretty quickly discovered that I’ve wasted my time. The Mi-Tientes just doesn’t want to accept any more layers. Which sucks, because I now have no details. I am a detail oriented artist, and to work this long and then not get to put my details into the piece that makes my work MY WORK is just heartbreaking.

On the lighter side, the Mi-Tientes blends beautifully with very little fall out. So there’s that. I will truck on and finish this owl to the very limits that this paper will allow, but after that I believe I will stick to the PastelMat. In this case, you get what you pay for.