Guana River in Summer

I have had almost no time for pastels since moving to Florida, but this past week I began taking a 4-week class with Lyn Asselta at the St. Augustine Art Association.  This is what I did in class on Thursday night. We are supposed to be painting the seasons in pastel, and learning about choosing cool or warm palettes to represent out chosen season. Tonight we were supposed to pick either summer or spring, and I decided to go with a somewhat warmer summer palette.

I totally adore the GTM Reserve Guana River center which is where my reference photo was taken, so it was fun trying to incorporate that area into a painting, using some of Lyn's suggestions in class.

Stinker One

LOL. I was doing some straightening up in my studio room this morning and came across some acrylic paints. Since it was sort of a quiet day I decided I might try to use one and paint a painting! Silly me. My mom used to try to get me to work with oils, acrylics and watercolors when I was young (as that was what she used) and I hated all of them. Hated fine arts in general until I discovered pastels and fell in love!

But I gave it a try, and ended up hating the result as much as I've always hated the pastels and oils I tried. I found my wrists could not hold steady when holding a brush. I hated not being able to go in there with my fingers. I hated the result. But it was all a learning experience so I might try it again anyway. I have nowhere to go but up. :-)

At any rate, this was done on an 8x10 canvas, and is my back yard.

First Coast Pastel Society

Today was the first meeting of our newly formed First Coast Pastel Society.  It's great to be part of a new pastel society here in my new home. The mission of the new society is:
"To promote the use of soft pastel within the FCPS membership and the community at large as an important and continually evolving fine art medium."

Our moving force and first President is Lyn Asselta, PSA and she's been a real dynamo at getting the group off the ground. We has 15 attendees at our first meeting, which I thought was a pretty good turnout, and we had a great time watching Richard Lundgren, PSA, demo how he prepares his own surfaces for painting upon gatorboard.