Degas' Ballerinas

I was incredibly lazy with my last chalk pastel drawing, that of the Last Supper. After drawing the detail on Jesus I told myself it didn’t matter about the others, as he was the main focal point anyway. It would have been difficult to draw detail on the Apostles in the background as they were so small, but I really should have made more effort with the one sitting closest to Jesus. Oh well, we learn by our mistakes, and this time I did my drawing in stages to avoid getting bored or tired. Actually, I feel that every piece is now a learning experience and only a stepping stone to the next piece. I am continually learning, and gradually my confidence is growing, allowing me to try more difficult pieces.




Surprisingly (to me anyway) I’m finding that I enjoy using the chalk pastels more than the oil pastels. I found the chalks incredibly messy to start with, but the most frustrating thing was that the picture I was working on would become smudged so easily. I’m finding ways around that problem now – I start on the left (as I am right handed) and spray the piece with varnish at various stages. I used cotton buds on this piece to blend the smaller areas which worked much better than using my fingers, but I still struggle with detail as the corners of my pastels have been worn down. I’m thinking I need pencils!


Chalk Pastels on A5 heavy weight paper