Good thing I sliced up that painting!

Aspen Road at Sunset, 9 x 12



Original size (12 x 16) of the above painting
before I trimmed it down.

 I was fortunate to have Aspen Road at Sunset appear in the recent issue of the Pastel Journal with an Honorable Mention for the 2011 Pastel 100 Competition.  It was also an award winner in the Pastel Society of America's 2010 annual show, and was sold at that show.  So I must've done something right with it.  I actually began this painting as a demo last year in one of my classes.  The topic we studied that day was clouds, which is why a good portion of the original version features clouds.  However, in the weeks following the demonstration, I felt something just wasn't right.  Overall I was happy with the clouds; I liked how the colors in the sky worked well with the colors in the rest of the painting.  But I tend to think that, with most paintings, if there's a lot going on beneath the clouds, then the clouds shouldn't call out for too much attention...the eye needs a rest somewhere.  I did consider cropping the bottom part of the painting and having more of the focus on the clouds, but liked the sunslight on the road and grass too much to part with.  Although the sunlight on the road ended up a bit more centered than I prefer, other elements of the composition worked well. I played around with cropping the image on the computer first, before I picked up an exacto knife, and once I was happy with what I saw on my computer screen, I sliced away!  I'm glad I did.