“Purely Pastel” is an exhibition of 72 abstract, impressionist and realist paintings created with pastels. It’s on view at the Alliance for the Arts through February 27.
The President of the Southwest Florida Pastel Society, Sue Dunlap, describes the medium: “Pastels are made up of the same pigment that you have in oil paint, held together with a little bit of binder so that you can pick up a stick. People might look at them and say, oh that’s chalk, but no, it’s pure pigment.”
Most people associate pastels with pale blues and pinks, but the paintings on display in “Purely Pastel” burst with color. Dunlap says she likes the medium because of its versatility.
“Part of the interest in doing pastels is you can layer colors over colors, and you can even lock in a color say with some alcohol or water, and then you can go over it again with a totally different color and it will be locked underneath. But most interesting is when you see the blends. You see layers that give you vibrancy.”
Although somewhat underappreciated today, the discipline is more than a hundred years old. Degas, Renoir, Cassatt and Picasso were among its early pioneers. The 100-member Southwest Florida Pastel Society has been carrying on that tradition for the past 25 years.
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Jan Ellen Atkielski served as the “Purely Pastel” judge.
Atkielski is a highly-regarded impressionist painter. Although she paints in pastel, acrylic and watercolors, her focus for the past several years has been painting in oils with palette knives.
Atkielski has a bachelor’s degree in art, has exhibited for more than 50 years, and has work in both private and corporate collections. Notable commissions include The Town Hall of Fort Myers Beach, the NFL Alumni Association and Northwestern Life Insurance Company. She also has one work in the permanent collection of the Milwaukee Art Museum. Jan Ellen has served as Executive Director of International Art Search, Inc. and is a lecturer and published print, television and radio author.
In judging the entrants, Atkielski applied a three-prong rubric: (1) skill in utilizing the medium of pastels; (2) originality in the sense of presenting something unusual or out of the ordinary; and (3) the “wow factor.”
She chose Maura Casorio’s “Sun on My Shoulder” as Best in Show.
In addition to applauding the artist’s choice of a square format, she cited the painting’s counterbalances, the artist’s beautiful handling of the figures in the composition, their wonderfully-unique pose and the use of negative space as features that merited the painting’s first place selection.
“This makes the painting tops,” she added. “It’s beautiful. I can’t find a single thing wrong with this piece. It’s absolutely lovely to me.”
Atkielski awarded second place to Dana Enders for her painting, “Trifecta.”
Atkielski complimented the artist for the painting’s subtle composition, in which the subjects, three white boats are viewed through the vertical pilings of the dock at which they are tied up.
“You see other boats, other masts [in the background],” observed Atkielski. “You didn’t overemphasize the pier and the dock. [The composition] just has a lot of nice counterbalance, and it’s an unusual and beautiful piece.”
She awarded third place to Catherine Buss’ “Picking in Xinyang.”
Atkielski especially liked this composition because of its originality.
“I’ve never seen anybody paint people going up a hill,” said Atkielski, drawing laughs from those attending the opening reception. “You have a really lovely sense of value and color, and this is just a gorgeous piece,” she told Buss, who was present in the gallery.
The Southwest Florida Pastel Society works to promote, stimulate and foster creative painting with pastels, encourage and promote pastel artists in their artistic growth and success, provide instructive programs and activities with exhibition opportunities for the benefit of pastel artists in their pursuit of education and understanding of the medium and nurture fellowship with other pastel artists and public awareness of pastel painting as an art form.
The Alliance for the Arts is at 10091 McGregor Blvd., Fort Myers.
Gallery hours are from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturdays.
For more information, telephone 239-939-2782 or visit https://www.artinlee.org.
Support for WGCU’s arts & culture reporting comes from the Estate of Myra Janco Daniels, the Charles M. and Joan R. Taylor Foundation, and Naomi Bloom in loving memory of her husband, Ron Wallace.