History of Pastel Painting and its Artists

Pastel as an art medium is both the most ancient technique used in art and one of the more modern techniques.

The use of pastel began roughly 250 years ago, although coloured chalks have been used for thousands of years. Prehistoric cave paintings in southern France, Spain and South Africa show that man's early coloured paintings used red, white, and ochre earth pigments, and burnt bone. Italian Renaissance Masters used a sort of red chalk to do technical drawings. Guido Reni 1575-1642, produced the earliest surviving paintings in a variety of coloured pastels.

Pastel has suffered from a poor reputation largely because of a lack of knowledge about the medium. Sometimes pastel has been described as chalk. But this is inaccurate.

Pastel is the most permanent of all media, when applied to conservation ground and properly framed. Pastel has no liquid binder that may cause other media to darken, fade, yellow, crack or blister with time. Pastel art from 16th century exists today, as fresh as the day they were painted. No restoration has ever been needed.

Traditionally it was used for making sketches preliminary to a larger work. Few people realize that it also can be used as a painting medium. Finished works of art can be rendered in pastels which are comparable to those done in other media. Pastel is not chalk. Coloured chalk is a limestone substance impregnated with fugitive dyes. Though some pastels contain a small amount of chalk to make them abrade more easily, pastel should not be confused with coloured chalk. They are made with exactly the same pigment used in making all fine art paints. Powdered pigment, mixed with a little water and a special binder is ground into a paste, rolled into sticks and allowed to dry. The word pastel is derived from pastello, Italian for paste. The softness or hardness of a pastel depends on the nature of the pigment and on how much binder is used, the more glue the harder the stick.

In the past, so many pastels were done with a weak, delicate appearance that pastel has become synonymous with light, delicate tints. This was a matter of choice of colours by the artists rather than a necessity. Pastel does not, at all, refer to pale colours, as the word is commonly used in the fashion and cosmetic industry. Pastel is a painting medium with a full range of artistic possibilities with a complete range of colours, values, textures and techniques being possible. Pastel is an immediate, spontaneous and luscious medium.

It is also a myth that pastels are impermanent because of the lack of light fastness. In the 1870's - synthetic dyes of brilliant hues were in wide use by prominent artists. Most of these dyes fade quickly when exposed to ultraviolet light. These fugitive dyes were still popular even as late as the 1940's. They were not only used in the making of pastels but also in the papers that were used as the painting surface. These dyes are no longer used in making pastels, but the reputation of impermanence still lingers.

Modern pastel is the most permanent of all media. When applied to a conservation ground and properly framed there is no danger of yellowing or cracking as in oils, they never require restoration, and they can last much longer. The cave paintings of prehistoric man in France and Spain which were painted using earth colours mixed with water, are considered the precursors of pastel painting. Some of these are more than 15,000 years old. An artwork done in pastel is fragile and can be smeared or damaged by rough handling, therefore it must be framed under glass, however, the painted surface is surprisingly sturdy. Unlike watercolours / watercolors pastel is an opaque medium.

In 1499 a French artist travelled to Milan taking with him brightly coloured sticks of dried pigment. In that same year Leonardo da Vinci created his portrait of the Duchess of Mantua, one of the oldest works in pastel that exists today. Drawn primarily in black and red chalk, it also has passages of yellow and brown pastel. He called the new technique 'the dry colouring method'.

It was in the mid 19th century that pastels were first used in a truly expressive way. The Impressionists especially Renoir and Degas loved pastel for the brilliance of colour and the quick application. Edgar Degas was the most experimental. Mary Cassatt, a pupil and friend of Degas, was responsible for the introduction and popularity of pastel in America.

French artists, such as Picasso, Redon and Vuillard, continued their love affair with pastels into the 20th century, until World War I brought a decline in its use worldwide. In the past 10 -15 years interest in pastel artwork has increased along with availability of artworks in the pastel medium have experienced a growing acceptance and popularity.