Portrait of Joseph and his Brother John Gulston (detail), 1754, Francis Cotes. Pastel on blue paper, mounted on canvas. The J. Paul Getty Museum
Pastels in Pieces
GETTY CENTER
South Pavilion, Upper Level
This is a past event
European paper was not manufactured in giant sheets until the nineteenth century. Competing with painters who worked on monumental canvases, eighteenth-century pastellists joined together multiple sheets of paper in order to create large, continuous surfaces. The piecing together of pastels, however, also served other purposes, allowing artists to paper over their mistakes or paste the heads of important sitters onto bodies posed by models. Matching each exhibited pastel with a map of its component sheets, this installation encourages visitors to consider how these objects were made.