Evening Light: Pastel and Painting by Michael Gaudreau
Cold Frosty Morning - Marcy Field, oil
Michael Gaudreau is an artist currently living in Bel Air, Maryland. Creating landscape artworks that seek to replicate delicate, early morning and evening light, Michael spends much of his time outdoors in Bel Air in the Adirondack mountain range of New York.
Working frequently in pastel, Michael does a great job of capturing the particular type of lighting that he seeks. The medium works well for creating images that have a slightly softened, impressionist appearance. Many of Michael’s landscapes show trees and forests in an autumnal state, which I find works beautifully with the dramatic lighting – pops of orange and yellow foliage emerge from darkened, almost muddy foregrounds to create very dynamic images.
The front page of Michael's portfolio website
Michael doesn’t only paint nature – his portfolio also includes numerous human figures and man-made structures like buildings and cars. Some of his most recent works include a pastel rendering of a fire truck. It’s great to see the technical differences between Michael’s drawing of a smooth, metallic surface and softer, feathered tree leaves and water.
