using an old credit card
Like a lot of artists, I have a signature style for my paid work, but I have a bundle of other art supplies and techniques I enjoy using, but don’t want to clutter up my commercial work with experiments. This is where my sketchbooks come in, as it’s a place for me to let off steam, creatively speaking, and indulge in other materials and methodologies.
I like strong pigments and simple shapes, which is probably why I struggle with watercolour and chalk pastels, even though I would like to be able to use them more effectively. I always loved the Miffy and Mr Men books, and the style of my illustrations for the birdwatching logbooks are definitely a nod to those core memories. I love the feel and messiness of oil pastels, and they are a way of using oil-based media in a cat-proof way, and also one that negates the need for toxic solvents for cleaning. This technique means it’s possible to use concentrated colours on regular paper – even thin copy paper – and is perfect for the super-smooth surface in my sketchbook, and more importantly, it doesn’t transfer over to the opposite page.
I subscribe to lots of artists on YouTube, and Drewscape is an illustrator with a very different style to mine, but I like his artwork and content. He is a very good teacher, and I have not seen this way of dealing with oil pastels before. Basically, he uses pen or pencil to draw the outlines, and then blocks in the colours, and then scrapes over the top of the sketch with a palette knife or old bank card to smoosh the pigment into the fibres, and take off the sticky top layer. Of course, this “wastes” a lot of pastel but as far as I’m concerned it’s even more of a waste to have materials languishing around for years becoming unusable, so even if most of the expensive Sennelier sticks end up on an old rag when I clean the card, it’s better than throwing them out because they’ve dried out or spoiled.
I chose some simple bird shapes for my experiment, and I am really pleased how they turned out. It is so much fun to scrape my old credit card over the top and see it go from gloopy and rough to subtle and smooth. I love pochoir illustrations (like the ones in this book by Mick Manning here) and I think the overall look reminds me of those beautiful French stencil illustrations:
What do you think?
