Travel Theme: Pastel

This morning, the newspaper announced, in screaming, umpteen-point headlines that … use of plastic bags was down 85%. This is because, last year, the Government decreed that a 5 pence levy must be made on the hitherto free plastic bags that supermarkets gave out. (Let’s leave aside that there are things going on in the world that are more meritorious of front-page headlines, otherwise I’ll never get to the point)

Anyway, an American friend said … why don’t they put the stuff in paper sacks, like they do at home?

Well, back when I was a kid … they used to. And, we loved those bags, because they were an almost infinite source of drawing paper; the rough surface took our coloured chalks nicely.

In time, the paper bags were replaced by Ingrès paper, and the chalks by pastels … bought from the art shop, rather than the toyshop. I thought this was a great way of producing images, because you didn’t have to fiddle around with a lot of messy paints, and a tin of pastels could be easily slipped into a pocket.

It took quite a while, though, before I started to realise that I wasn’t as good an artist as I thought I was, and gradually, the camera began to replace pastels as my preferred way of visual expression.

Photography grew in appeal because I really liked bold, brash, saturated colour. But, pastel has its place in photography, too. There’s always room for subtle, muted colour such as a good pastel drawing gives. I’m sure I’ve got some in the files that would serve to illustrate this piece …. somewhere!

This week’s contribution to the Travel Theme. More at https://wheresmybackpack.com/2016/07/30/travel-theme-pastel/