Color, powder, portrait and light
Top 50 famous pastellists: color, powder and light
From Rosalba Carriera, Maurice-Quentin de La Tour and Liotard to Degas, Cassatt, Redon, Helleu, Paula Rego and Sam Szafran, this guide follows the artists who made pastel a major art.
Pastel has a very particular magic: it is at the same time drawing and painting, powder and light, immediacy of the hand and depth of color. It allows you to capture a face, a fabric, a reflection, a dancer, a bouquet or a landscape with an intensity that oil does not always give.
Before the grid
Why pastel occupies a special place
Pastel seems fragile, but its history is immense. In the 18th century, it became one of the great mediums of European portraiture: fast, luminous, capable of rendering skin, powder, velvet and gaze with an almost lively proximity.
In the 19th century, Degas, Cassatt, Morisot, Redon, Manet and Toulouse-Lautrec transformed it into modern language. Pastel no longer only serves to soften a face: it accelerates composition, releases color, captures movement and opens up another way of painting.
Top 1 to 10
The great masters of pastel
Degas, La Tour, Carriera, Liotard, Perronneau, Chardin, Cassatt, Morisot, Redon and Manet give pastel its letters of nobility: portrait, modernity, flesh, color and vibration.
#1
Edgar Degas
Degas makes pastel a laboratory of movement: dancers, baths, races and interiors vibrate in layers of colored powder.
See the Edgar Degas collection
#2
Maurice-Quentin de La Tour
The Tower gives the French pastel an exceptional psychological presence, between worldly brilliance and truth of the gaze.
See the Maurice-Quentin de La Tour collection
#3
Rosalba Carriera
Carriera imposes pastel in Europe with portraits of powdery, luminous and refined softness.
See the Rosalba Carriera collection
#4
Jean Etienne Liotard
Liotard pushes pastel towards an almost tactile precision: skin tones, fabrics, porcelain and faces seem to breathe.
See the Jean-Étienne Liotard collection
#5
Jean Baptiste Perronneau
Perronneau gives pastel portraits a very personal touch nervousness and color intensity.
See the Jean-Baptiste Perronneau collection
#6
Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin
In his latest self-portraits, Chardin transforms pastel into humble, serious and deeply human matter.
See the Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin collection
#7
Mary Cassatt
Cassatt uses pastel to translate gestures, motherhood, clear light and emotional proximity with frank modernity.
See the Mary Cassatt collection
#8
Berthe Morisot
Morisot makes pastel an art of air, white, children, women and barely remembered moments.
See the Berthe Morisot collection
#9
Odilon Redon
Redon releases pastel into flowers, visions and apparitions, until the color shines from within.
See the Odilon Redon collection
#10
Édouard Manet
Manet uses pastel with direct freedom: figures, women, faces and whites gain a new freshness.
See the Édouard Manet collectionRanks 11 to 20
Portraits, colorful pencils and European courts
From Whistler to Vigée Le Brun, Labille-Guiard, Holbein, the Clouets and the first British masters, pastel continues the tradition of colorful drawing and ceremonial portraiture.
#11
James McNeill Whistler
Whistler explores subtle harmonies of gray, mist and silhouettes in pastel, between drawing and visual music.
See the James McNeill Whistler collection
#12
Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun
Vigée Le Brun practices pastel with grace, flexibility and elegance, in the great tradition of the portrait of the Enlightenment.
See the Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun collection
#13
Adelaide Labille-Guiard
Labille-Guiard asserts a mastery of pastel and female portraiture in an academic world that is still very closed.
See the Adélaïde Labille-Guiard collection
#14
Marguerite Gérard
Gérard brings pastel, genre scene and domestic intimacy together with a very French narrative delicacy.
Read the biography of Marguerite Gérard on Wikipedia
#15
Federico Barocci
Barocci announces the sensitivity of pastel through its colorful studies, its soft chalks and its luminous preparations.
See the Federico Barocci collection
#16
Hans Holbein the Younger
Holbein prepares the art of pastel portraiture with aristocratically precise chalk drawings.
See the Hans Holbein the Younger collection
#17
Jean Clouet
Clouet established in France a tradition of portraiture with colored pencils, an essential ancestor of the art of pastel.
See the Jean Clouet collection
#18
François Clouet
François Clouet refines the court portrait with precise sheets where color, line and social status interact.
See the François Clouet collection
#19
Daniel Gardner
Gardner mixes pastel, gouache and chalk for elegant, lively and slightly theatrical English portraits.
Read Daniel Gardner's biography on Wikipedia
#20
John russell
Russell is one of Britain's great pastellists, attentive to flesh, fabrics and lighting effects.
Read John Russell's biography on WikipediaRanks 21 to 30
European elegance, neoclassicism and Belle Époque
Cotes, Hamilton, Hoare, Mengs, Graff, Kauffman, Helleu, Boldini and Toulouse-Lautrec show that pastel can be worldly, nervous, theatrical or intensely graphic.
#21
Francis Cotes
Cotes gives British pastel a clear, worldly elegance, with a real science of skin tones.
See the Francis Cotes collection
#22
Hugh douglas hamilton
Hamilton excels in pastel oval portraiture, fast, bright and highly sought after in Grand Tour Europe.
Read Hugh Douglas Hamilton's biography on Wikipedia
#23
John Downman
Downman favors delicate profiles and portraits, where pastel softens the line without losing presence.
Read John Downman's biography on Wikipedia
#24
William hoare
Hoare made pastel a refined language of British portraiture, particularly in the elegant society of Bath.
Read William Hoare's biography on Wikipedia
#25
Anton raphael mengs
Mengs brings a neoclassical restraint to pastel, between firm design, polished skin tones and ancient ideals.
See the Anton Raphael Mengs collection
#26
Anton Graff
Graff uses pastel for sharp, intellectual portraits, where light shapes personality.
See the Anton Graff collection
#27
Angelica Kauffman
Kauffman uses drawing, chalk and pastel in a supple, elegant and narrative neoclassical aesthetic.
See the Angelica Kauffman collection
#28
Paul Cesar Helleu
Helleu makes pastel sparkle in social portraits, women in hats and the lights of the Belle Époque.
Read the biography of Paul César Helleu on Wikipedia
#29
Giovanni Boldini
Boldini uses pastel as a burst: nervous lines, dresses, looks and electric elegance.
See the Giovanni Boldini collection
#30
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
Toulouse-Lautrec mixes pastel, chalk and drawing to capture posters, dancers, cabarets and silhouettes of Montmartre.
See the Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec collectionRanks 31 to 40
American impressionism, posters and pastel
Renoir, Pissarro, Guillaumin, Fantin-Latour, Tissot, Chéret, Bakst, Chase, Hassam and Henri move pastel towards modern light, the stage and the city.
#31
Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Renoir finds in pastel a softness of flesh, light and color close to his sensual impressionism.
See the Pierre-Auguste Renoir collection
#32
Camille Pissarro
Pissarro uses pastel for landscapes, markets and figures where the light keeps its direct vibration.
See the Camille Pissarro collection
#33
Armand Guillaumin
Guillaumin pushes pastel towards powerful purples, pinks and blues, serving a very colorful light.
See the Armand Guillaumin collection
#34
Henri Fantin-Latour
Fantin-Latour gives pastel a floral and dreamy sweetness, between portrait, bouquet and musical atmosphere.
See the Henri Fantin-Latour collection
#35
James Tissot
Tissot combines worldly precision, fabrics and powdery surfaces in very refined pastel compositions.
See the James Tissot collection
#36
Jules Chéret
Chéret brings a luminous cheerfulness to pastel, close to posters, dance and Parisian celebration.
See the Jules Chéret collection
#37
Leon Bakst
Bakst uses pastel, gouache and drawing for costumes and sets where color becomes spectacle.
See the Léon Bakst collection
#38
William Merritt Chase
Chase defends pastel as a modern medium, suitable for portraits, interiors and rapid lighting effects.
See the William Merritt Chase collection
#39
Childe Hassam
Hassam transposes the streets, gardens and windows of his American impressionism in pastel.
See the Childe Hassam collection
#40
Robert Henry
Henri uses pastel with frankness, for direct, lively portraits, far removed from academic finish.
See the Robert Henri collectionRanks 41 to 50
Ashcan, modern color and contemporary pastel
Glackens, Shinn, Bellows, Sloan, Laura Knight, Wolf Kahn, Paula Rego, Joan Mitchell, Sam Szafran and Wayne Thiebaud prove that pastel remained a powerful medium in the 20th century.
#41
William Glackens
Glackens finds in pastel a bright, social and urban color, heir to Renoir but very American.
See the William Glackens collection
#42
Everett Shinn
Shinn uses pastel for theaters, streets and night scenes, with a very Ashcan graphic energy.
See the Everett Shinn collection
#43
George Bellows
Bellows gives pastel a modern vigor, capable of capturing sport, street and urban tension.
See the George Bellows collection
#44
John Sloan
Sloan approaches pastel as a vivid medium to capture street scenes, popular interiors and everyday life.
See the John Sloan collection
#45
Laura Knight
Knight continues the tradition of pastel in theater, circus and strong female figure scenes.
Read Laura Knight's biography on Wikipedia
#46
Wolf Kahn
Kahn makes pastel a vibrant field of color, between observed landscape, abstraction and atmospheric light.
Read Wolf Kahn's biography on Wikipedia
#47
Paula Rego
Rego gives pastel a narrative, carnal and sometimes disturbing power, far from any decorative sweetness.
Read Paula Rego's biography on Wikipedia
#48
Joan Mitchell
Mitchell uses pastel in an abstract energy, close to colorful drawing and interior landscape.
Read Joan Mitchell's biography on Wikipedia
#49
Sam Szafran
Szafran radically renews pastel with its stairs, foliage and labyrinthine workshops.
Read Sam Szafran's biography on Wikipedia
#50
Wayne Thiebaud
Thiebaud transposes his taste for gourmet colors, clear shadows and luminous surfaces to pastel.
Read Wayne Thiebaud's biography on WikipediaMethod
How the 50 pastellists were selected
The ranking favors artists for whom pastel, colored chalk or powder drawing play a real role in the work: pastel portraits, colorful studies, autonomous works, impressionist modernity, symbolist color, stage, landscape or contemporary experimentation.
The selection balances historical importance, visual quality, influence, diversity of schools and the way in which each artist reveals a specific strength of pastel: softness, precision, speed, light or chromatic saturation.
Choose an entry
Where to start?
To understand the golden age of pastel portraiture, start with Rosalba Carriera, Maurice-Quentin de La Tour, Liotard, Perronneau, Chardin and Vigée Le Brun.
For modern pastel, go to Degas, Cassatt, Morisot, Redon, Manet, Toulouse-Lautrec and Helleu. For a more contemporary reading, continue with Laura Knight, Wolf Kahn, Paula Rego, Joan Mitchell, Sam Szafran and Wayne Thiebaud.
Pastel, a light placed directly on paper
These fifty artists show that pastel is not a minor art nor a simple preparatory tool. It can be psychological portrait, pure color, modern scene, memory of gesture or mental space.
Its strength lies in its paradox: a crumbly, almost volatile material, yet capable of producing images of extraordinary presence. From the European court to the modern workshop, pastel remains one of the most direct paths between hand, color and light.
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