The Art of Pastel

INTRODUCTION ‘Pastel: powdered colour with an infinite range of shades and gradations, of unfading freshness and intensity, spanning more than 1650 nuances of the colour spectrum, and particularly fitted for ease and rapidity of handling, immediate transcription of an emotion or an idea, easily effaced, easily reworked and blended. The pigments can be rubbed in, made luminous and velvety, or given a soft and silky matness of grain. Pastel is line and colour at once.’1 We are delighted to present The Art of Pastel: Three Centuries of Works on Paper, an exhibition in which we aim to draw attention to the central importance of the pastel medium in the work of some of the finest draughtsmen in Western art from the 18th through to the 20th century. Inspired by our shared admiration for this versatile medium, we have assembled this small but carefully chosen group of pastels over some time; not as a complete history of pastel, but to highlight the inventiveness and artistic exploration that this medium has inspired among artists. A number of works come from private collections, and have not been seen on the art market for decades.

The unique structure of pastel lends itself to infinite opportunities for artistic expression. It confers a non-yellowing brilliance and a velvety appearance when it is applied to paper and is, even though fragile, produced in over 1,500 different shades and hues. It can be blended to a smooth finish, or each stroke can be kept distinct to connote fleeting movement and light effects. Pastel is bright, luxurious and fluid, and can be used to capture the twinkle in an eye, the breeze over a landscape or the velvety tones of a night-time scene. While the purity, strength and richness of colour of the pastel medium allowed artists to achieve remarkable effects, they also had to work with speed and precision, sometimes blending the pastel strokes with a finger or stump to create ever more diaphanous effects.

First mentioned with reference to Leonardo da Vinci at the end of the 15th century as ‘the manner of dry colouring’, pastel only began to be used widely by artists in the 17th century. Unlike red, black, and white chalks, which occur in nature, pastels are manufactured from a combination of pure pigments and a water-soluble binder, shaped into sticks and slowly dried. The advent of commercial pastel manufacturing in the 18th century saw a rapid increase in its use, especially for portraiture, as perhaps best exemplified in the work of Rosalba Carriera. However, it declined in popularity in the early years of the 19th century, until revived by Romantic artists such as Eugène Delacroix.

The second half of the 19th century followed with a remarkably creative period of richness, diversity and experimentation in the art of pastel. Drawings and works on paper were increasingly valued, collected and exhibited as complete works of art in their own right, while in France the Société des Pastellistes Français was founded in 1885 to promote the work of artists working in pastel, with the first exhibition dedicated to this medium held in Paris the same year.

Pastel reached its apogee with the Impressionists, who were attracted by the wide variety of colours available with which they could capture the bright and transient effects of nature and light. As Christopher Lloyd has aptly noted, ‘the proclivity for pastel in its many forms shown by several of the Impressionist and Post-Impressionist draughtsmen derived…from its centrality in the debate between line and colour: it was none other than drawing and painting at the same time.’2 The portable nature of pastel sticks also gave rise to their use for recording nature en plein air by artists who preferred to take their easels outdoors and work quickly, rather than in the artificial conditions of the studio. This versatile medium was also employed by the Impressionists to capture spirited portraits of their contemporaries. The medium was brought to new heights by Edgar Degas, who in his later work blended pastel with gouache, tempera and oil paints diluted with turpentine.

The 20th century saw artists exploring the boundaries of how to perceive and record the visible – and invisible – world around them. Many artists chose the bright colours of pastel to exaggerate visual effects of nature, or the spiritual or abstract, in order to express a heightened emotional response. The works in this exhibition exemplify how pastel has retained a freshness and contemporary quality. Thanks to its synthetic nature, colour spectrum and velvety effects, pastel remains relevant to many artists today, who continue to explore the boundaries of experimentation in this medium.

Sophie Camu Stephen Ongpin