Left is the picture pre-framing, with the pastel bleeding over the edges. The framed version was supposed to trim off some of this but it does a bit more than I think I would have liked. It’s currently hanging at the art studio for the end-of-year show we had but once I get it back I’ll update this with a final frame and mat version as well.

Before the fall I hadn’t touched it for five years but I’d managed to keep it largely dust-free. It’s larger than all of my previous pastel paintings, which is at least one factor making it take longer to complete. I’ll probably change the publish date on this post as I make updates so it will be obvious when something’s changed.

Update 1/28/10: Starting to work on the rocks (sorry, Amir). This is a bit tedious as many of them use the exact same color combinations.

Update 2/4/10: More rocks.

Update 2/18/10: More rocks, this time on the left side of the fall.

Update 2/25/10: Finally got some kind of base color on all of the rocks in the piece.

Update 3/4/10: Brown glazing over left side rocks.

Update 3/29/10: Missed a couple of classes for various reasons. I’m concerned I’m not going to finish this in time.

Update 4/1/10: Trees and grass.

Update 4/12/10: Trees and more trees.

Update 4/15/10: Trying to make the trees more irregular.

Update 4/26/10: The end is in sight!

Update 5/6/10: Finished.

I’m dating the posts containing the images with the approximate date the works themselves were completed, so they’re not going to show up on the front page as the earliest ones are from 2000. Wow, remember Y2K? I’m missing one pastel painting because I dropped it off at Johns Hopkins University for an art exhibit just last week.

This is also one of those situations where having thumbnails in the excerpt section would be quite helpful, but thanks to my crummy styling it looks like poo if there isn’t a lot of preview text. Since I don’t have speeches to make after every picture, thumbnails are disabled for now. Yes, my site needs another redesign.

Moonlight over water. Pastel, completed December 2004. I gave this picture to Rachel the day of our wedding.

A beach at low and storm tides. Pastel, Low Tide completed December 2002, Storm Tide completed May 2003.

Mare and Foal. Pastel, completed May 2001.

I based this on a picture in a book of WW2 fighter planes, but I can’t remember which model this was. Pastel, completed December 2000.

Graphite pencil, completed sometime in May 2000.