What can I paint pastels on, you may ask? As always, you have choices. You can always start on sandpaper for instance. However, watercolour paper is fine as you can put a tint on it first with any water based paint. To obtain a good texture, how about covering your paper with a good gesso or acrylic paint first.
If you pay your local art shop a visit, you will find that there are plenty of basic papers you can use, suitable for this type of work, which also come in many colours. Sandpapers too, are always interesting and these not only come in different colours but also other textures.
Oil sketching paper is ideal for oil pastels. It is similar to canvas and it is quite easy to find in the shops. Smooth, hot pressed paper or water colour medium, (not surface), is a good choice to make. Brush and line styles can be mixed. If you make a mistake you can correct this by erasing it with mineral spirits.
Ingres Paper is possible too, it is thinner than Mi-Tientes, but will allow flexibility of your colours with mineral spirits. The surface is also fairly strong.
With Mi-Tientes paper the right side has quite a texture to it, but you can cover your paper well by using the mineral spirit with the pastel to gain fluidity and it does not spoil your paper. Turpentine tends to be on the oily side so I would not use this.
A good cloth to ask for is soft pastels paper. Paper cloth with a strong back, but is a synthetic mixed cloth so you can underpaint it, but it stays firm when wet.
Flour Paper is terrific for pastels, usually obtained only in small sheets.
Let's go to Sandpapers now: Wet or dry? You have the two choices of Sandpapers. This paper is Black and you can put a wash on it and as it only comes in small sizes I would choose the finest, type 400. If you would like to use large sheets in a natural colour you can purchase Artists' Quality Sandpaper.
Velour Paper keeps the colour pigment and this I would use for strong, heavy, much worked type paintings. This has a sort of powdered coating to it.
"Not" is a water colour paper, is very popular. Unfortunately only available in white. This is good as you can use with a dry wash of pastel, by tinting with acrylics, watercolours.
Generally it is better to use acid free papers, as otherwise the colours may fade in time. I think that recycled paper often works well, if all else fails. It is trial and error experimenting with the different surfaces available. If you want to do heavy work, you can buy pastel papers which are affixed to mat boards. This is a nice strong base on which to work. Although it is not acid free, I think good results can be achieved on ordinary brown wrapping paper.
If you pay your local art shop a visit, you will find that there are plenty of basic papers you can use, suitable for this type of work, which also come in many colours. Sandpapers too, are always interesting and these not only come in different colours but also other textures.
Oil sketching paper is ideal for oil pastels. It is similar to canvas and it is quite easy to find in the shops. Smooth, hot pressed paper or water colour medium, (not surface), is a good choice to make. Brush and line styles can be mixed. If you make a mistake you can correct this by erasing it with mineral spirits.
Ingres Paper is possible too, it is thinner than Mi-Tientes, but will allow flexibility of your colours with mineral spirits. The surface is also fairly strong.
With Mi-Tientes paper the right side has quite a texture to it, but you can cover your paper well by using the mineral spirit with the pastel to gain fluidity and it does not spoil your paper. Turpentine tends to be on the oily side so I would not use this.
A good cloth to ask for is soft pastels paper. Paper cloth with a strong back, but is a synthetic mixed cloth so you can underpaint it, but it stays firm when wet.
Flour Paper is terrific for pastels, usually obtained only in small sheets.
Let's go to Sandpapers now: Wet or dry? You have the two choices of Sandpapers. This paper is Black and you can put a wash on it and as it only comes in small sizes I would choose the finest, type 400. If you would like to use large sheets in a natural colour you can purchase Artists' Quality Sandpaper.
Velour Paper keeps the colour pigment and this I would use for strong, heavy, much worked type paintings. This has a sort of powdered coating to it.
"Not" is a water colour paper, is very popular. Unfortunately only available in white. This is good as you can use with a dry wash of pastel, by tinting with acrylics, watercolours.
Generally it is better to use acid free papers, as otherwise the colours may fade in time. I think that recycled paper often works well, if all else fails. It is trial and error experimenting with the different surfaces available. If you want to do heavy work, you can buy pastel papers which are affixed to mat boards. This is a nice strong base on which to work. Although it is not acid free, I think good results can be achieved on ordinary brown wrapping paper.
About the Author:
This "Guide" has been offered to you by Anna Meenaghan, a contemporary artist, who has been involved in the arts all of her life. As a contemporary painter she has suffered a lot of "mishaps" herself and is now happily giving advice to newcomers to the world of art by submitting articles on various subjects. Comment by Michael Bruckner.
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