Painting Small Places

Concrete Weeds

7 x 10 soft pastels on Art Spectrum Colourfix

Miki Willa

I had an idea when setting goals for the year that I would like to do a series of small seemingly unimportant places. The first one was the Poppy from a couple of days ago. That was from a small corner of my old garden. This one is based on a photo I took at the bottom of a set of concrete steps a long time ago. I really like the composition, and I decided to use a complementary pallet. In this case, I used my favorite of blue/lavender and yellow/orange. This combination never fails to get my attention in a positive way.

Now that my pastels seem to be settled in their new homes, I thought I would share what I use. I started this pastel journey with a student set I purchased at the local Ben Franklin craft store. It was fine enough to get me hooked. Then my husband shared his Rembrandts. We purchased a small set of Unisons and a small set of Senneliers. Then Tom took a workshop with Terry Ludwig. It was love at first use. His was my first choice for a couple of years. Last summer, Tom and I decided to try new sets after a Pastel Artists of Hawaii meeting where we got to try different brands. As a result, I now use Terry Ludwig's, Great Americans, Unisons, a small number of Girault and Sennelier. We don't have large quantities, but we are having fun with what we have. Now, if I could only learn to like paper other than Art Spectrum. I really like that surface.