Leaving Town

Wow am I delighted with this one! It pays to take time off from a given medium because I have been away from oil pastels for a bit and now they feel really exciting! This piece is so sunny and magical. It immediately sets me dreaming. Leaving Town continues my passion for landscapes with rolling hills and hidden paths leading off to the future. In this case there is also a small family of trees standing witness to our travel.

I am hopeful this vibrant symbolic image will help some fellow seeker out there to begin an important and long awaited journey.

Oil pastels are a bit tricky to work with. Some colors cover others, some remove the layer below them, and some mix with the colors below. So it takes lots of experience to learn the ins and outs of layering oil pastel colors. As I often do, I laid down a VERY bright underpainting and then used a straight-edged razor blade to strip that off, leaving behind colorful stains on the mat board. Next, I built up layers and layers of colors from darker colors to lighter ones. And I finished with some key highlights and lowlights.

(How Leaving Town might look in a standard-sized 8" x 10" frame.)

This drawing was created on an acid-free mat board. It has been sprayed with fixative, but oil pastels are always a bit soft. You will want to frame this piece in order to protect the relatively fragile surface. It can be framed at a savings if you pick out a frame at your favorite home store and then bring that frame and your new drawing together to the local custom framer and ask them to mat the drawing to fit the frame.