Spend an intensive two days learning the basics of pastel painting and its application to creating innovative and exciting paintings. This workshop will cover the technical applications of pastel, color, and artistic considerations using demonstrations and practice sessions.
Students will learn:

 Basic pastel techniques
 Different pastel brands, pastel papers and the use of fixatives
 How to block a painting in with three values
 Three different ways to start a pastel painting
 Developing thumbnails for problem solving
 Focusing on the importance of lost and found edges
 The importance of squinting and how it simplifies your subject matter
 How to frame and mat your pastels
 Critique sessions

This workshop will assist students in obtaining a certain level of confidence in their painting ability and to acquire skills that can be used with any painting medium.
Students will be encouraged to paint from still lifes but can bring their own reference material (photos, sketches, etc).

MATERIALS

431 Steel Gray Canson Pastel Paper
NuPastels and your soft pastels.( starter sets would work fine with both)
Pastel support/drawing board for 11”x 14” paper
Kneaded eraser

Mike Beeman is a signature member of both the Pastel Society of America, the Pastel Society of Colorado, and also belongs to the Pastel Society of the Northern Rockies. He has been has been a finalist in the Top 100 annual competition in the Pastel Journal’s Magazine for 2005 and 2007.