Basilica - Hand Embellished
This 110x73cm oil pastel painting on watercolor paper, is the street showing the west façade leading up to the famous St. Stephen's Basilica in Budapest. This is the first painting in my “Budapest" series and was made to simply be put on my living room wall. Oil pastels were the medium chosen because I had been trying to convince my distance learning IB art students, during Covid, that they should try a medium that was dry and easier to transport and keep at home. I put my money where my mouth is when I decided to see if I could take on the challenge myself.
I used a photograph as a reference but re-contextualized what I borrowed to create a new work of art. As this was my first serious oil pastel painting, I wanted to come up with a unique style that would express my love for Budapest through bold color, playful rhythms and raw emotional impact. I tried to use impressionistic strokes to engage the viewer’s eye with texture and movement.