PASTEL, the simplest of all methods of laying colour upon a flat surface. The colours used consist practically of the pure pow der colours; whereas in other methods, the colours have to be mixed with some medium, the immediate result often being that the tone of the colour is lowered, and even if on drying the orig inal tone is restored, as in fresco (q.v.), the artist while at work can only calculate what the picture will look like when dry. In pure pastel as the colour is put on so it remains. The disadvan tage of pastel is that its life is precarious, not because its colours are more fugitive than in other methods but because it remains on the surface of the paper, liable, unless protected by glass, to be rubbed off by any chance touch. On the other hand, if certain precautions are observed during the course of applying the colour it is able to resist violent shocks.
Pastels are made up into cylinders or pencils with the least amount of adhesive (a gum) necessary to hold the particles of colour together in the lightest possible manner, so that a touch of the pencil on the surface of the paper leaves an impression. Pastels as sold by the modern dealer, are usually arranged in a series of tones, the darkest pencil consisting of the pure colour; all the other pencils of the series are mixed with white to a greater and greater degree as they ascend the scale toward the lightest. Thus the artist has a certain number of tones ready to use at once.
Pastel can be applied as a pencil, i.e., by means of lines or short touches, or it may be rubbed. By far the best way of rub bing pastel is with the pad of the tip of the finger; if stumps are used they are apt to remove most of the powder. Speaking gen erally pastel should not be fixed, the use of the fixatives at once alters its character; it is converted into a painting and all the tones are lowered, and the beauty of the surface is at once de stroyed. It becomes like a butterfly's wing dipped in water. No fixative is satisfactory, but one, which serves its purpose, is a weak solution of parchment, size and water blown on with a spray diffuser from a considerable distance.
Sometimes a very little fixative may be used in the early stage as this prevents a heaping up of the powder, the fixative making what is there firmly and thinly adhere to the paper, but the final touches must be pure pastel. It is easy by loading pastel upon
the paper to reach the end of the possibility of this method, there fore, above all, the artist must learn to apply the powder very thinly and to keep the colours as much as possible clear and defined. A dirty mess is the end of a good many pastels.
Pastel has most distinctly a character of its own and should be used with an understanding of what it can do and what it cannot do. It should not be used to imitate oil-painting which it cer tainly cannot do without entirely altering its natural character.
It should be considered as a method of applying colour, which owing to the practical absence of a medium is higher in tone than in any other method, thinly to the surface of the paper so that as in water-colour the actual paper itself may occasionally play a part in the design. With this knowledge of its proper use, very beautiful results can be obtained. It is an excellent method to use when a portrait is required, but better for small portraits than large ; a life-sized head in pastel is seldom satisfactory and gen erally becomes overloaded with colour, It cannot pretend to the carrying power of oil-painting; it may be described as a more humble medium and, therefore, is not to be employed in large designs. (H. To.) The invention of pastel, which used to be generally called "crayon," has frequently been accredited to Johann Alexander Thiele (1685-1752), landscape-painter and etcher of distinction, as well as to Mme. Vernerin and Mlle. Heid (1688-1753), both of Danzig. But the claim cannot be substantiated, as drawing in coloured chalks had been practised long before, e.g., by Guido Reni (1575-1642), by whom a head and bust in this manner exists in the Dresden Gallery. Thiele was perhaps the first to carry the art to perfection, but his contemporary, Rosalba Carriera of Venice (1675-1757), is more completely identified with it. The Dresden Museum contains 157 examples of her work in this medium, portraits, subjects and the like. Thiele was followed by Anton Raphael Mengs (1728-1779) and his sister Theresia Mengs (afterwards Maron, 1725-1806), and by Johann Heinrich Schmidt (1749-1829).