Cretacolour 8B Aquarelle Graphite/pencil drawings and paintings

"Without good drawing, the foundation of a painting will collapse." Ken Danby

In my post dated 27th January, I mentioned about my recently created artworks using Aquarelle graphite pencil. Posted below are some randomly selected works which I have created in the past month using a single Cretacolour 8B aquarelle graphite pencil. I purchased the set of 6 pencils from Amazon. 

Before getting into Cretacolour 8B pencil, I experimented with the Camlin water soluble graphite sticks. However I found it a more convenient option to use pencils.

A seashell

A gate

Trees

A scene from Phuket

A flower

As I am enjoying these small aquarelle graphite works sized 4" X 5.5", I have gone ahead and ordered a set of 4B aquarelle graphite too. The plan is to use them both in combination to get a better effect. 

You can browse through my charcoal and pastel artworks now at INSTAGRAM too.

Thanks for visiting my blog and if you have used aquarelle pencil in your art work, I would love to hear from you. Do leave a comment. 

Thumbnail sketches in the soft pastel medium

Thumbnail sketches or Preliminary works in soft pastel medium.

As mentioned in my last post, I decided to get back to Soft pastel paintings and the best way to warm up is by creating a few "Thumbnail sketches" or the "Preliminary study works". Thumbnail sketches are fun because it is done more freely and spontaneously. It is a vital step in drawing and painting and I have made it a habit to follow this disciplined routine. 

 The soft pastel sketches sized 4" X 5.5" are done with reference to scenes from Coorg and Himachal Pradesh. The time spent in creating each of these sketches was about fifteen to twenty minutes. It's just one layer of pastels without any kind of detail works.

A scene from Coorg

On the banks of Kaveri river ( Karnataka )

On the way to Ladakh

Journey to Ladakh

Spiti Valley

A lot of planning and effort goes in creating a simple thumbnail sketch which then serves as a reference for my future art work. I try as much as possible to create bigger works of using all my study works. 

As a part of Christmas Day Celebrations, I am glad that I recently got the opportunity to hold a "Pencil Sketching Workshop" for twenty five lovely kids at Sneha Sadan, an orphanage at Jogeshwari west. I got about enough time to teach them value shading, design and composition, shading and blending techniques. Later I demonstrated a "Simple Archaic Door" drawing and all the kids followed the step by step procedure to create the same. It was a pleasure to share my knowledge and technique with the kids and I have offered them to be there for other workshops too in future.

"How you draw is a reflection of how you feel about the world. You're not capturing it, you are interpreting it." Juliette Aristides

A beautiful quote and I love it all the more because I truly believe in it. Every painting that I create is of a "SUBJECT" that I love and feel the connection with it. It is my interpretation of the scene. My intention is not to create a photo realistic image but rather a work which speaks for my creativity and thoughts that went into making it happen.

Working with Cretacolour 8B water soluble graphite pencil

Water soluble graphite pencil

Adding new art stationery has become a norm. It is exciting and challenging at the same time. It adds to a change in the otherwise day today routine work which in my case is "Working with charcoals and pastels". 

I purchased Camlin water soluble sticks in March 2016 and enjoyed creating a few study works using the same. I am a big fan of "Black and white works"  and the art created by using these water soluble sticks gave the feel of water colour painting.

In order to work a little more on this medium, I went ahead and ordered 8 B Cretacolour water soluble graphite pencil from Amazon so that I could use it in combination with Camlin water soluble graphite sticks. These days before ordering stationery online I make it a point to read the reviews about the same. It helps a lot as it saves a lot of disappointment later.

Given below are the six small 4"X 5.5" landscape paintings ( Using water soluble graphite ) which I created in my  new sketch book that I purchased recently. In most of these works I started off with the initial drawing and shading with the 8B Cretacolour pencil and after running the wet brush at places, I let it dry. In the second stage I picked up the dark tone from 8B Camlin stick using a wet brush to apply it at places where I felt needed darker values. I am enjoying these water soluble pencils and am even contemplating buying the DERWENT brand which is available online at a very competitive rate.

Cretacolour 8B watersoluble pencils.

Camlin water soluble

graphite sticks 2B, 4B, 6B.

"In art, the hand can never execute anything higher than the heart can imagine." Ralph Waldo Emerson