Butterfly, flutterby

I needed some stress relief from all the tension of the US Presidential election, so I thought I'd do something quick and simple, something that would just be fun without needing too be too technical. 

Not sure why I chose this picture, landscape and platns are not usually my thing. I guess the photo reference just made me happy.

Photo: Larisa Koshkina from Pixabay

This painting is very small, only 15 x 21cm done on one of the Clairefontaine Pastelmat samples I received from Overjoyed. What was supposed to be a quick drawing took hours in the end, mainly because I was having so much fun heaping colour upon colour. I'm getting accustomed to working on Pastelmat and what everyone says is right - it allows for many, many layers of pastels, even the super soft ones, so is very forgiving (you can just layer on top of mistakes).

As usual, I used my Schmincke and Sennelier soft pastel sticks. I just love the vibrant hues.

What I was most pleased with is the painterly effect. I'm not sure how I pulled off the colour marks in the background without them all muddying into each other, but somehow it worked. I've never painted this way before, so am quite happy with my first try.

Available for sale.