Sketching a Mountainscape using white pastel pencil

The black Strathmore Artagain 400 series paper is fun to work with. I have not tried the pastel chalks on it, however the white pastel pencil works really fine on its smooth surface. After my last work that I created recently, I was inspired to do another one on the same subject.

Therefore I went ahead with my next creation of yet another of my "Mountainscape" in this series using the white pastel pencils. The source of light in the sketching below is from the right and hence accordingly I had to work out my highlights and shadows. 

White pastel art work on a black paper is a great way of doing a "Value study".

The Peak

White pastel pencil sketching on black paper

Size 4.5"X 5.5"

"Painting is just another way of keeping a diary." Pablo Picasso

White pastel pencil sketching on Strathmore paper

A beautiful, inspiring Quote...

"Learning never exhausts the mind." Leonardo Da Vinci

Sometime back I posted my white pastel sketching of a Mountainscape which I created on

Strathmore 400 series black paper. I enjoyed creating the sketch and had it in mind to create

a few more in the same series because I felt that this is a simple sketching process which is not 

very time consuming and in return helps to understand the unique aspects of each mountain range with respect to scale, form, value and detail. 

For the sketching below I have once again used the snow mountains as a reference. The source of light is from the left which helps in deciding on the light and the dark values. The black colour of the paper acts as the darkest value. 

The slopes

White pastel pencil sketching on black paper

Size 4.5"X 5.5"

I have used three different pastel pencils to complete this work namely Conte, General and Cretacolour. In the initial stage I use only Conte as it is lighter and much smoother in

comparison to General and Cretacolour.

Conte, Cretacolour and General white pastel pencil

Tonal value study of a Landscape

Today's post is a tonal value study of a landscape with mountain and slopes.

The fun part is that I did not do it alone. I had an artist friend over at my place. She has done her
fine art from Chitrakala Parishath, Bangalore. Whenever we meet we create a small piece of
art. This time we had about three hours of time between us so we decided to try out a tonal value study sketch on Black Canson Mi Teintes paper. This work required the use of only white pastel pencils and a kneaded eraser.

So we went ahead and created this white pastel pencil sketch. Apart from the sketching we
had a lengthy discussion on art related topics. We also decided to meet more often as it gives
us an opportunity to interact, share and create more art.

Tonal value study of a Landscape

with mountains and slopes.

White pastel pencil work on Canson Mi Teintes paper.
Size 5"X 7"

"The first things to study are form and values. For me, these are the things that are the basics  of what is serious in art." Jean Baptiste Corot. ( French Painter )

The quote as above speaks a lot about what every artist feels and experiences in life. To get
better at anything we have to get the basics right. Value study helps in rendering the colours
in a very effective manner.

Thanks for browsing through my artworks. 

6" X 9" Soft pastel paintings - Landscapes

"Art is not what you see but what you make others see." By Edgar Degas

After a long break, I created two soft pastel paintings using my miscellaneous collection of

soft pastels. I worked with soft pastels for many months at a stretch in 2014 and the beginning 

of 2015. In the past few months I have been indulging in a lot of water colour artwork and 

the water colour medium is undoubtedly the most challenging one. 

With my water colour paintings I am still experimenting and exploring. However with my soft

pastels my technique is almost set. But I am open to trying out something new.  

Charcoals and soft pastels are both dry mediums and a lot in the painting happens as per your 

technique of holding the chalk and creating the strokes and blending. Over a period of time we 

all get used to a particular way of doing our artwork and that starts defining our individual style.

I complete my painting in two layers. In the first layer I usually do a little blending but in the 

second layer I normally use a lot of strokes and very little blending.

Apart from using soft pastels, I have also used Camel charcoal pencil at places to define a few

things such as rocks, crevices in mountains etc.

Road to leh

Soft pastel painting on Canson paper

Size 6" X  9"

Komic village

Soft pastel painting on Canson paper

Size 6" X  9"

My pastel palette

Which has broken pastels from different brands.

Both the above paintings have been submitted in the DPW challenge

I have a Two days soft pastel workshop coming up soon and thats

another reason for getting into a few pastel works.

My works can also be viewed on my FACEBOOK page.