I have always admired the bright colors and the dynamic brush strokes in van Gogh's paintings. Kristina's class gave me the chance to dive deeper into his techniques using an unusual medium - oil pastels.

My oil pastels I had stored somewhere never using them because I don't really like the rough structure of the strokes. Nevertheless I gave it a try and the copies of van Gogh's paintings turned out fairly well but when it came to the portraits of my family members I must admit - the result is not convincing. (My family wasn't pleased with their portraits - they even didn't recognize themselves :(  )

I noticed that the spreads in my (watercolor) sketchbook have different textures - whereas the van Gogh copies are painted on a slightly smoother paper - the family portraits were painted on a very structured surface so the strokes appeared  harder than expected and I even couldn't smoothen them with a blender.

So a smooth paper is essential for a satisying result. Anyway I had a new experience and I think I might try van Gogh's technique with gouache again.

Thank you very much, Kristina for this new approach to a great master!