| Artists' Pastels - In The Making |
 The very word pastel painting evokes images of Degas, the most famous exponent of this exciting medium, which is characterised by vibrant matt colour.
Pastel paintings in their present form date from the 1750s, but if we include the chalk drawings on cave walls, they trace back to prehistoric times.
Pastels have a charm and texture unmatched by other media, an effect created by unbound pigment on the surface of the paper.
Unlike oil colours where pigment is bound in drying oil and glued to the canvas, pastel marks are held by the interweave of paper fibres.
 True they can be dislodged by a flick of the finger, but the apparent fragility of pastels shouldn't deter the artist from using them.
Pastel paintings from the 18th century remain as bright and fresh as the day they were painted. Daler-Rowney have been making pastels since the 1830s and they are now the acknowledged masters.
Pigment, chalk, china clay and small amounts of binder and preservative are wet blended together. Unlike other colour ranges, the pigment is not ground to a smaller particle size, but simply blended to give the correct tint.
A small sample of wet pastel mix is oven dried and tested against the standard for colour and mark.
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