Tools Not Jewels

When looking at the pristine displays of pastels in many Facebook groups, I often wonder if the people posing with their obviously unused spreads of high end pastel sticks actually do anything with them? or are they just displayed to promote envy amongst others. Yes, they look fabulous lying untouched in the boxes but at the end of the day as I say they are tools not jewels, so drag 'em out and do something with them. 

Having cleaned my box of blues it was time to put them into action, so a new painting is in progress! 

While I was getting soaked sketching in the old mill in the rain in Baunach, I had taken some photos of the river beside where I was working and they are the reference for this painting, 

It's  the sway of the grasses that I'm loving here, hoping to catch that movement. As for my palette, after using so much green in Ophelia, I'd like to stick with some amazing blues. 

After I the thunderstorm and rain had passed, the sun came out and the sky suddenly took on that intense blue, so intense that it hurts your eyes ....... that will be the mood of this work, lots of zingy summer blues! 

I think the title's going to be ‘’shameless summer blue'', it’s inspired by lyrics from Mark Knopfler. And I must admit while I sat sketching in my soggy wet clothing and undies, I found it particularly shameless that after heaving water in buckets upon me, the sun should come out like that! I could actually see the steam rising as I dried!