Who's The Boss? ....in stages

I began this one with diffused alcohol/ pastel washes on Sennelier sanded La Carte paper.

I attended a demo a few nights ago by Mike Beeman, a wonderful pastellist from Cheyanne and he showed this technique.

It's funny, as I always knew that water and this surface would not mix, it removes the sanded covering in seconds, so I stayed away from an underpainting technique.

However, I never thought to use alcohol on it, which dried very quickly. One still has to be gentle , it will disturb the surface if you smudge too much with the brush, but it does work if you are careful. The surface is best left to dry before trying to pastel over the top.

I have done this with other surfaces, and just never thought to do it on Sennelier which is one of my all time favorite surfaces with which to work.

I am shocked I did not think to do this technique. It goes to show how important it is to watch others work, we can always learn something.

The color of this paper is a very soft tan green, which is a lovely value to use.

I truly had no idea what I would paint, and was just playing. The two first photos (left to right) on this page, show my IPad photos, which are not that clear I am sorry.

The second one is showing the two photos I had of roosters dragged onto the underpainted surface which I did in Sketch Club.
The other photos are my steps in pastel as I developed the painting.