Alongside the Dunes | Artists Community


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Along with a fascination with the ocean’s ebb and circulation, pastel artist Jeanne Rosier Smith is equally captivated by the shore’s sand dunes. Get her knowledgeable perception on portray these “waves” of sandy soil.

By Jeanne Rosier Smith

This text seems within the Summer season 2024 subject of Pastel Journal. Get the complete subject HERE.

Undulating, cresting and curving on the fringe of ocean or lake, sand dunes mimic the transferring water simply past them. The truth is, the dunes are additionally transferring, simply not as rapidly or clearly because the waves. Whereas this makes them extra cooperative portray topics, they nonetheless pose their very own challenges. Low-lying sundrenched grass and sand may, at first look, look like a tricky climb, however listed below are 15 ideas which have made the dunes considered one of my favourite ongoing portray topics. Most of the following tips apply to work in any medium.

Photograph References

Since I don’t dwell on the shore, I typically depend on picture references once I’m portray. Whereas they’re a robust instrument for catching compositional fodder, they’re far much less dependable for shade and worth. (They make sand shadows too darkish and blue, and sunny areas too flat and white). Portray from life each time I get the prospect jogs my memory of the dunes’ true values and colours—and provides me a greater sense of how you can alter my images digitally for a extra practical interpretation.

Basking in Mild (pastel on paper, 8×16)

Composition

Use gentle strategically. Dunes exhibit most at dawn and sundown, when their curves throw shadows and catch highlights.

Compose dunes utilizing worth shapes reasonably than land plenty.

Decrease your perspective to search out diagonals and to extend focal drama, as in Basking in Mild.

Anchor your composition with grasses; their windblown shapes provide shade, distinction and linear selection.

Underpainting (in Pastel)

Use cool reds beneath darkish dune grasses, as in Underpainting (under). They complement layered greens and develop into native shade for the dried grasses that type the dune base.

Use heat, gentle oranges and yellows beneath sunny patches of dune grass, as seen across the dune rim in Underpainting.

Place rosy pinks beneath sunny sand.

Use heat neutrals in shadowed areas.

Layer with heat and funky shades of comparable worth to create sand textures within the shadows. As planes change inside a shadow form, think about that their temperatures may also shift based mostly on what the airplane faces. For instance, in Nearly There, the values are shut, however I layered the deepest blues alongside the suitable aspect. Including a number of hotter, lighter strokes dealing with towards the lightest areas of the sky strengthened the curved space of the dune path.

Underpainting for Nearly There
Nearly There (pastel on paper, 6×12)

Sand

Set up your values within the solar and shade first. Then, discover heat and funky variations in every worth to emphasise these temperature variations. For instance, Within the Hush of Daybreak, the blue patch helps to convey that the sand is cool.

Belief your eyes and needless to say sand displays the sky and environment. In shadow, cooler colours of mirrored sky predominate and blend with native, heat sand shade. In gentle, sand displays heat, gentle, and sky.

Within the Hush of Daybreak (pastel on paper, 8×8)

Edges

The sunshine and shadow edge alongside the crest of a dune gives a possibility for texture, stroke expression and focus. Deal with this space rigorously by sharpening some edges and softening others, as in Summer season Breeze.

Summer season Breeze (pastel on paper, 8×8)

Grasses

Hold grass plenty so simple as attainable.

Search for colours apart from inexperienced among the many grass, akin to pink, peach, brown and gold. Begin with darkish areas and layer lighter.

Add particular person reeds as the ultimate step; place them sparingly amongst grasses that catch the sunshine, as in Summer season Morning Reminiscence.

Summer season Morning Reminiscence (pastel on paper, 16×20)

Meet the Artist

Jeanne Rosier Smith, of Sudbury, Mass., is an award-winning pastelist. She’s a well-liked instructor and gives numerous on-line movies and educational packages at EpiphanyFineArt.com.

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