The following is a guest blog post by Cindy Salaski, author ofOil Painting with the Masters: Essential Techniques from Today’s Top Artists. Here, she profiles Kevin Macpherson, who teaches readers how to create a dynamic landscape painting by using bold brushstrokes in Oil Painting with the Masters.Kevin Macpherson majored in illustration at Northern Arizona University and feels he was very fortunate to have Chris Magadini as his instructor.

I’m thrilled to welcome artist and author Jean Pederson to the family of bloggers here at ArtistsNetwork.com. Read on for her advice below and then be sure to check back to ArtistsNetwork.com regularly for more great tips from Jean. Today, she gives you tips for choosing an art instructor that will be right for you.

I’ll be honest with you all–I am not a painting technician. I read a lot about art and, as you know, love to look at paintings and drawings all day long, but I am still a babe in the woods when it comes to many methods and approaches to painting.For example, I’ve heard a lot about the sight-size painting method, but it’s been challenging to find someone who can answer my questions about it and really prep me on both the rudiments and the big-picture aspects of it.

Practice–But Not WorkWe are fierce believers that drawing the human face takes practice, but it isn’t work. That is because there are rules to follow and an effort to put behind it, but the process isn’t anything but something to revel in if you have artistic leanings.So enjoy more than a dozen tips on drawing the human head from one of our favorite artists Paul Leveille and then see about further embarking on a portraiture voyage with the sketches and insights from Everett Raymond Kinstler, a seasoned expert whose book, Impressions and Observations, is a must-have for learning artists.

One of the pleasures of pastel is its ability to be placed on a wide array of surfaces, producing a variety of appearances. A couple of weeks ago, I was at Dakota Art Pastels in Mount Vernon, Wash., teaching a workshop. As I entered the warehouse for an afternoon of pastel indulgences, Robyn Williamson and Craig Lemley (owners of Dakota Art Pastels) asked me to try out a sample of a new paper called Pastelmat, which is being introduced in the U.

In the June issue of Pastel Journal (on sale here), master pastelist Albert Handell shares his approach to painting adobe buildings, one of the essential elements of the Southwestern landscape. Here’s how he explains the idea:Muddy color can happen when colors of different values are mixed together or applied side by side.