Albert Handell at the IAPS Conference

The highlight of the IAPS Conference was Albert Handell’s demonstration on painting trees in pastel. Having only seen his work and his person in pictures and books, I found him to be a highly sensitive, serious artist. Although he was tolerant of audience artists who did not share his focused passion, he does not have one second to spare away from his own ideas.

I was able to get a seat in the first row to watch a large screen projection of the piece as he worked, and the comments he made during its creation included technical and personal thoughts, which he voiced almost to himself. He started with Nupastel Bottle Green (on Uart 500), making a linear sketch with calligraphic marks. The subject (tree) was viewed as a living object, and was treated with as much care as one would treat the portrait of a person. He mapped out its placement in general, and then went in for ‘this’ tree and its individual character, working from a photo that he had taken himself. When asked if he knew what species of tree it was, he almost railed against the question, stating it didn’t matter, as (and I know this is true myself) labels destroy essence. Being very explicit with contour lines to define the form within the subject, he visually explained the masses and edges, using the direction and slant of the light. Shadows, both cast and form, created interest and further brought out dimension.

Once the structure of the tree (no color yet) was brought up to his satisfaction, he loosely began the background forest, but only in the vicinity of the subject. As he worked, he brought each area into an almost finished state before moving on to another area. An insightful comment he made was that if an artist wanted to cover the whole paper first, as most artists are inclined to do, they can be that insensitive to the subject if they want to be. The background forest was painted in each area, and then the tree itself. Working from dark to light, and from cool to warm, he did not hesitate to add further detail as he went, letting the picture dictate what it needed. He also stated that pastels are about color, but can easily become too colorful.

When he finally reached the edges of the paper, he thinned out the pigment to give breathing room. He spoke often of rhythms throughout the process, and uses divergent marks -- vertical/horizontal, dots, dashes, mass - both opaque and thin, lost and found edges. The last step in his process included the most delicate scumble of shades of mauve over various areas of the picture. As he added these, he said ‘you can’t really see this’ - and then a long pause - ‘but you can feel it.’

All artists know there is a point in every picture when we know it is going to work, and as he approached this point he knew it, and told himself out loud the picture was good. At the finish he stood back and said he could think of nothing more to do to improve it.