The world of pastel painting is filled with luminous colors, impulsive mark-making, and sheer delight at seeing bold swathes of pigment leap from paper. Yet, if you’re a beginner or even a seasoned pastel enthusiast, you’ve likely faced two big hurdles: the overwhelming cost of building a quality set of colors, and the disappointment of discovering that many “budget” pastels simply don’t perform. Could this set of 72 handmade soft pastels from Lightwish, bridge the gap between price and quality? Let's find out.
June is the halfway point of the year. It is the perfect time for artists to pause, assess what has worked, let go of what has not, and recommit to the creative habits that matter. Persistence is not glamorous. It is not always exciting. But it is often the real difference between artists who grow and artists who give up too soon. Read on, watch the video and get your Six Month Success Workbook for free.
If you love Impressionism and want a simple, enjoyable way to learn more about this remarkable art movement, I have created a free mini course just for you. This course introduces the key ideas behind Impressionism, including its defining characteristics, painting techniques, and the fresh way artists approached light, color, and everyday life. Read on to take the course.
 One of the most common objections I hear from students is this:
“I want to paint looser, but I’m afraid of wasting paint.” This is understandable. Oil paint is not cheap, and when you are still building confidence, it can feel risky to load the brush generously and make bold strokes. In this article you will receive five great tips to solve this problem. 
We’ve all been there: you start a painting with grand intentions, but somewhere around the two-hour mark, you find yourself “noodling”—fussing over tiny details, over-blending, and scrubbing away the energy you captured in your first few marks.
Suddenly, your vibrant, impressionistic vision feels tight, muddy, and stiff. Looseness isn’t a lack of discipline; it’s the result of absolute control. If you want to paint with the confidence of the masters, you have to stop “polishing” your work and start making deliberate statements. Here are my top five secrets for mastering loose, expressive brushwork, plus one bonus technique to give your paintings that “Bravura” wow factor. 
If you’re just starting out with oil paints or want to expand your skills, these five key techniques are a great place to begin. Learning them will help you handle oil paint better and create lively, expressive art with real depth. Here’s a look at each technique, what it involves, and why it’s useful for beginners.
Let’s be honest: for many artists, the “skin tone” section of a painting is where the confidence fades. We’ve all been there—trying to mix a perfect complexion only to end up with something that looks like muddy grey or neon orange. You reach for that one “flesh tint” tube, and it just never looks quite right on the canvas.
Capturing the nuance of human skin—the warmth, the cool shadows, and the subtle shifts in translucency—is one of the most rewarding challenges in figurative art. The good news? You don’t need a degree in color theory to get it right. You just need a better system. I’ve put together a compact, punchy mini-course designed to strip away the guesswork and give you the exact recipes you need to mix lifelike skin tones with ease.  Every artist knows that the creative journey is about more than just brushes, paints, or clay. It’s about inspiration, discovery, connection, and sharing ideas. That’s exactly why I’m excited to announce the launch of Create Art Magazine, a brand-new digital publication designed to showcase creativity and bring artists together in a vibrant, supportive space.
The very first issue will launch on 1 September 2025, and I’d love for you to be part of it. Best of all, subscriptions are completely free. When you sign up, you’ll receive a beautiful flipbook edition of the magazine delivered straight to your inbox, with new editions arriving every two months.  If you’ve been looking for a lightweight, no-fuss easel for plein air painting—or simply something that doesn’t take over your studio space—the KraftGeek Inspire Tripod Easel may be exactly what you need.
I recently got my hands on this compact tripod easel and gave it a full test—from unboxing to setting up outdoors in my backyard for a quick impressionist painting demo. In this post, I’ll share my experience and why I think this easel is a solid option for both beginners and pros. 
I'm working on a new book. It's about daily reflections, helping creatives and artists generate ideas and explore more creative activities each day and getting the best out of each day. I'll be sharing a few videos over the coming weeks or months, featuring some of the ideas I'm working on. One of the ideas, starting from the beginning, is to explore the concept of gentle consistency. See how this idea can help you reach new creative goals.
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AuthorMalcolm Dewey: Artist. Country: South Africa 
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