I hadn’t created any kind of art in a while, so for inspiration to get going with it again I watched a couple of Youtube videos by pastel artist Susan Jenkins of Monet Cafe.

She’s good. Really good. The kind of good that makes what she’s doing look easy.

Feeling inspired a few days ago, I pulled out a piece of sanded pastel paper and my assortment of soft pastels, and tried to follow along with one of her videos. Below is round one of my work in progress:

I stopped at this point because A) I was tired of fiddling with it and B) I wasn’t sure where to go with it. I decided to leave it on my easel until it bugged me enough to try fixing it. Which happened today.

I was busy cleaning up, going in and out of the room where I keep my art stuff, occasionally glancing at the work in progress taped to my tabletop easel when I it suddenly hit me–it’s too dark. Cleaning forgotten, I pulled out my pastels and dragged a chair over to the easel. I was going to paint light.

A couple of hours later I once again hit a wall of not knowing what more to do or if more would even help, so I closed my pastel box and pushed back from the easel. Here is the final result:

I still see things that I want to fiddle with, but overall I think it’s a bit better. To avoid overworking it more than I already have, I’m calling it done. I want to become a better artist, but taking classes would be difficult for a variety of reasons. I’m hoping that frequent practice combined with instructional videos will help me to achieve this.

I’m so grateful for the artists who have videos on Youtube. For anyone else who’s interested in soft pastel art inspiration, you might want to check out Susan Jenkins, Alain Picard, Karen Margulis, and Lana Ballot on Youtube.