To tackle the problems I had with oil pastels, I made some experiments in the sketchbook and on loose sheets of black and blue paper. This time I decided to integrate these loose sheets into the sketchbook so that I would have these experiments together in one place, rather than distributed across sketchbook and diverse folders I maintain with my works for the course.
The experiments focused on colour and mark making. I chose the range of yellow to green tones and tried to blend colours. I also tried out at what point the paper would be nicely coloured without becoming saturated and creamy. This was after four softly applied layers in the sketchbook, but it was much faster on the black paper which had a very smooth surface. So one conclusion was that for oil pastels, rough paper is much better suited for building up colours in layers.
I also tried out some scratching and used plastic knives to scratch into thicker oil pastel layers. The marks are quite fine and look interesting, although they wouldn’t be visible from typical viewing distance. They also wouldn’t help if the paper is already saturated, because they do not re-open the surface. It was also an interesting effect to distribute the tiny oil pastel crumbs, which were on the knife after scratching, over clean areas of the paper. This produced fine marks, interesting to look at but again not appropriate for typical viewing distance of an oil pastel drawing. But scratching and redistribution of crumbs would be nice techniques for smaller works which are looked at from reading distance.
The final experiment was with blue, textured paper. I used the “wrong” side first, which had a very pronounced texture of tiny regular squares. This came out immediately when applying the oil pastels, because the oil pastel only stuck to the higher parts of the paper and there were all the regular holes in the colour layer. I tried building up colour and blending, but I didn’t like the look. I folded the paper to try out the other side, and this was much better. There was still texture, but it was irregular and resulted from paper fibers rather than from the paper production process. In the sketchbook the “folded page” shows the marks on this side, whereas the “open page” is with the experiments on the regular textured side.
Doing these experiments was very pleasurable, and much less exhausting than the fruit and vegetables drawing. Maybe this was because doing this type of thing corresponds better to my current skill level, where I still need to do much experimenting, rather than trying to produce artwork. If I was to continue, I would do simple coloured objects next and see whether I could transfer some learning when trying to build up blended colours and light and dark areas of objects.
For textures, I’d rather go back to pencil studies. For example if I were to draw the table again with oil pastels, I’d start out with a study of the wooden surface but doing it in pencil to learn how to create the plaited structure and its light and dark areas. Then I might proceed with an oil pastel study of only a small area of the table. Only after that I’d tackle again the complete drawing.
So maybe the very frustrating feelings I had during the oil pastel drawings taught me how I might go about next time. It was also nice to just freely explore the medium as I had done with felt pen in the first project of Part II (exploring coloured media). I also realized that I’ve also learnt something about methodology through the course already. For example, after the first page of free experimenting, I continued with focused experiments in small rectangles because I think this technique can help in trying out one thing after the other in a more systematic way.
Experimenting with oil pastel is definitely something I would like to continue. Will have to see whether coursework provides some opportunity for this or whether I will have to do it on my own.