'Do what you enjoy doing most'

That is what a very dear friend advised when I told her I was 'struggling' arty crafty wise.

So that is exactly what I did.

Amongst my collection of old images I chose this photographer - and mounted him on some backing paper. I then proceeded to use my pastels to highlight and shade not only him but also the backing paper - so it looks totally different to the original paper. I just looked at it and saw 'different' things in it - so I shaded and highlighted again - so there are now honeycomb areas, I sketched in the stylised tree which started off as a single swirl - and ditto other areas. It is now just an abstract in the background - but maybe you can see other things. I can.
What I do see is the ugly bold border so tomorrow I am going to soften that with white pastel - so that it fades into the background - it is far too dominant
If you had seen the fuzzy photo - and all the background and roads etc you would never recognise this little portion I cut out and used.

Same backing paper as before.


The poster behind the boy I have really highlighted with white pastels and contrasted with black. Ditto the lad himself who now has defined knickerbockers, legs, and socks - until I looked at him very very closely I thought 'he' was a little girl. By chalking his face and hair too he now is very much a lad.

I like to think that behind him it is akin to 'typing' graffiti - and a skyline - but there you go - that's me and my pastels and imagination for you!