Chick on a Pedestal

"Chick on a Pedestal"  (pastel, 6x6 inches)  sold

What happens to a chick when you put her on a pedestal? Well then you have to look up to her. Like a movie star. She becomes larger than life (which a close-up at 6x6 is!) But don't expect any thanks. She won't notice you beneath her. Her gaze is on the horizon of her glittering future.

This chick was actually an exercise in a limited palette. My pastel box is still in the truck after the Victoria demo and there it will stay until I'm back down there this weekend for the workshop because I'm too lazy to unload.

 

So I put this Chick's primed board up on my easel for a quick 'daily' workout, I turned to the table next to my easel and that's when I noticed the missing pastel box! Nothing but my two latest Unison sets, some misc Girault flesh tones, and the tiny shards of my (sort of) cleaned out box from last week.

I looked back and forth between my primed Chick and my assortment of pastels on the table for a couple of seconds, and decided I would go at it anyway with just these. I had the Unison yellow-green-earth set of 18 (which I love!!) and a little set of 8 violets. No real reds, but what saved me were the tiny bits of my best deep orange and bright yellow that I found among the leftover shards. I let the gold primer do a lot of the talking in this one. Another 'trick' was the blue background which made the warm feathers look more intense than they really were.

Here are the progress shots:

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