Art by Niki Hilsabeck

 "Fallbrook Field" 8 x 12 Pastel on Paper Click here to view purchase details This is my 200th post.  I was heartbroken to find out that my absolute favorite art teacher (well, next to my grandma of course), David Musser, passed away in December.  You can see David's art here. I took my first pastel class with David in 2004.  Before then, I didn't even know what soft pastels were, since I'd only used oil pastels.  I struggled at first, and was especially mortified when he pulled a chair up next to mine and said he was going to make me his "special project," and that I'd be able to use pastels with ease in no time.  Fortunately, he was right! I could fill an entire blog with things I learned in David's classes (I continued with pastel, and also took some basic drawing and watercolor classes with him over the years).  He was one of the most entertaining people I've ever met, and he truly enjoyed helping his students create-- he shar...

"Egyptian Pitchers" 9 x 12 Chalk Pastel on Paper Click here to buy print: http://www.redbubble.com/people/nikihilsabeck/art/6190856-1-egyptian-pitchers-pastel I liked these pitchers, and wanted to paint them. I was having trouble getting started because they looked so... orderly. Upon closer examination, I noticed that the necks on a couple of them tilted at a slight angle. This made them a little more interesting, and gave me an idea-- why not exaggerate the tilt to make them more fun to look at? So, instead of trying to faithfully render the pitchers, I rearranged them a little and increased the tilt on some of the lines. I was enjoying the effect of the extra soft pastels on the toothy dark paper, and wanted to keep some of that soft light, so I left those areas alone. The original pitchers were all pretty neutral in color, so I added some brighter colored accents and complementary colors to liven them up. I always think to myself that if I had a little more control and p...