Something special about the feel of the pastels in your hands. You do not need to mix or mess with brushes. You just grab a stick and go. The colors slide behind, and they create colorful tracks. It is pure color, pure color, straight and simple. You will soon see in a course about pastel painting how to accept this simplicity. The best part? There's no "perfect" way to do it. You are able to test and to err and you end with something beautiful. Want lesson breakdowns, read the article about course structure.
Pastels are extremely versatile. You can make them soft and smooth gradients or sharp and dramatic lines. Desire your colours to be softly gliding into each other? Blend them. Need to establish contrasts? Press down hard. Pastels can be used on anything. A pastel course will make you appreciate the response of the medium to pressure and texture, how the medium can be layered, mixed, and smudged until the right feeling is achieved in your piece. It is as though you are learning a dance, you get your rhythm and the rest just falls into place.
The capability to capture light and texture is one of the most decent things about pastels. In contrast to paint, the pastels are applied on the top of the paper, forming a layer of vivid shade that nearly feels like it is glowing. Using colors to create depth also makes your artwork come alive in a way that cannot be easily reproduced using other media. A course in pastel will make you know how to use light to make your paintings look alive--how to make the emphasis on some parts and create shadows that appear real. Not color on the paper, but making the colors sing to you, like a concert of colour on the page.
In case you are afraid of making mistakes, pastels are very forgiving. Mess up a stroke? Smudge it out. Want to try something new? Just layer over it. The coolness of pastels is that you do not need to worry about dripping up, you can just continue trying it until it looks right. This course will learn you to exercise this freedom, and will demonstrate you how to adapt your work dynamically without slowing you down. It is all the fun of it--greasy hands, and mixing colors, and watch what will come of it. No stress, just creativity.
In a pastel painting course, you'll also be taught not only technique, but also to rely on your gut. It has no strict rules and the more you play around the more you will find your own form. Pastels are a matter of emotions-- what you want to feel good in, what gets you fired up. It only takes some practice to discover your own flow and you will soon be able to paint your own worlds without any restrictions. It is an experience of liking the process and letting the pressure of being perfect go. Take your pastels, and begin to make--where will you go, you know!