Pastel painting

It’s a heart-thumping kind of game: I pulled off the tape that was holding this in place, put away the pastels and other materials, signed it, and propped it up, all while averting my eyes. Then I left the room and came back in, glancing over at it from the doorway, as if I had never seen it up close. I wanted to see if the magic had worked, and to a pleasing extent, it had. Scrawls, strokes and dabs of oily sticks on paper were transmuted into light on water.

Just as some ink paintings are called drawings, making this felt like painting even though it was done with a dry medium without brushes. I think I’ll paint the same scene tomorrow.