Daisy8x11 inches
Soft, hard and pan pastels and some coloured pencils on wood
I have been asked by several artists how spraying of multiple coats of both fixative and varnish affects the pastel work, and so thought I would do a work in predominantly pastels to see just what happens. There was definitely quite a lot of sinking and changing of colours, particularly in the background, so for anyone who is concerned about keeping their colours true, then I wouldn't recommend this process at all. In this instance though, so long as the skin tones stayed reasonably true, I wasn't too worried about changes in the rest of the artwork - in a funny way, I actually like the unpredicability of how the finished artwork will appear. I was a little heavy handed in some areas of the background where I have tried to soften the two corners that I felt were too dark, but did find that much of the softer overcoat darkened into the undercoat. I should probably have taken a before and after scan to show the impact on the pastels and will do that next time so you can get the full idea of colour changes.
