“Oliver”, 9×12″, pastel on paper by Annie Dash Studios
Last year, I took formal photos of my son, Oliver, to document him at this adorable age in his childhood. He wore a special suit that was handed down to our family by my Godmother, whose grandsons wore it. I just loved his wide-eyed expression and soft smile in this photo, and chose to create a pastel portrait inspired by it.
“Oliver”, photograph by Annie Dash
For the pastel portrait, I significantly softened the lighting and kept the soft light beige background color of the paper instead of darkening it to match the dark grey backdrop of the photo. This was done to highlight the softness and innocence of childhood and create an overall radiant image.
Like my paintings in wet media, I worked in many layers. Below are cell phone photos of the work progression during each stage of the pastel portrait (starting in the bottom left). I started with an initial line drawing to place the highlights and shadows, then worked in pan pastel to add the shadows in violet and umber tones, added the base layers and built upon them, finishing the details in pastel pencil.
I loved working with the pastels! This was one of the most enjoyable projects I’ve ever worked on — I absolutely loved it!
I hope you enjoy this piece as much as I enjoyed creating it. Pastel is such a beautiful, unique medium with exquisite layering and blending ability. I also love that I had the opportunity to paint with the PanPastels and draw with the pastel pencils — so versatile. I look forward to working with this fantastic medium again in the future!
Have you ever worked in pastel? What was one of the most valuable lessons you learned from it? If you’re not a pastel artist, what do you find interesting about this type of work? Please feel free to comment below!