Monthly Archives: June 2018

A big pastel drawing finished!

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Viva Lamore by Suzanne Forbes detail pastel on Mi Teintes June 26 2018Using pastels on dark paper is so weird.

I started this drawing of Viva Lamore at Dr. Sketchy’s Berlin “Broken Baroque” session quite a while back. She is the producer of Full Moon Cabaret as well as lots of other artistic projects, and a frequent Dr. Sketchy’s model; I love to draw her. I worked on this one a good bit at home, but couldn’t figure out how to resolve it.

So I tabled it for a while, to see if I got more comfortable using pastels.

One of my beloved Friend-Muse-Patrons sent me a box of Prismacolor Nupastels for my birthday. Those were my favorite pastels in college, if I could have been said to have a favorite in a media I do not love. They are square in profile rather than round and both harder and more waxy than most pastels. I find them much easier to control and they lay down a lot of pigment on my toothy Canson Mi Teintes paper.

Viva Lamore by Suzanne Forbes mixed media 32cm x 41cm June 26 2018I also knew I needed a workable fixatif to freeze each layer of color as I laid it on.

But I was having trouble finding the kind of workable fix I used in art school.

Eventually I figured out that Winsor and Newton “soft fixative” is the same product. It’s sold as Professional Fixative now in the US, I believe. It’s a (virtually odorless! brave new world!) spray fixative that holds the dusty pigments in place, and creates a new layer of tooth for the next layer of pastel to catch on and adhere to. I ordered some and went back to the picture of Viva this week.

Portrait of Viva Lamore in media media and pastel work in process by Suzanne Forbes 2017 to 2018

The process of adding layers of Prismacolor Nupastels to a portrait on Canson Mi Teintes paper by Suzanne Forbes, 2018

Pastels are imprecise anyway, so I can use them fairly well with my injured hand.

The problem with workable fixatif, or any fixatif, is that when you spray them on, they adhere the pigment particles to the paper with an adhesive medium. Which has the effect of darkening the pigments. I hadn’t had much trouble with the Lascaux fix I’d been using, but the new can totally knocked out my highlights.

Portrait of Viva Lamore in media media and pastel work in process by Suzanne Forbes 2017 to 2018After each spray of fix I had to go in and restore the highlights. The paper got coarser and coarser, although as promised the fix does build a new layer of tooth. You can continue to add pigment on the surface for a long time. The lightest values in the drawing you see in the photographs aren’t properly fixed; they could easily be rubbed or wiped off. But that is a problem for another day.

I feel like this is a nice depiction of Viva’s beauty and mischief!

Evilyn Frantic at Dr Sketchys Berlin Burlesque Week June 23 2020 by Suzanne Forbes Edited June 23 2020: I also finally finished a long-tabled drawing of Evilyn Frantic!

Thanks so very much to my Patrons on Patreon whose financial support makes it possible for me to experiment and grow as an artist. You sustain me.

Moving to Berlin in 2018: a trip to the Zoll.

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Schoeneberg Zollamt by Suzanne Forbes June 10 2018The Zoll is where packages from America are held for ransom, if they don’t get lost.

I finally had to go there a while back, due to the error of an Amazon seller. I had scrupulously avoided it for three years!

Of course I made a drawing. Everyone there was perfectly nice, contrary to the yelp reviews.

If you are planning a move to Berlin, do not mail yourself anything or have anyone mail you anything bigger than a postcard.

The Zoll will open it and charge you duties on it probably even if it is a gift or even if it is your old clothes from college. It’s just not worth it to wait a million years for your package to arrive, then get a letter from the Zoll, schlep over to the Zoll, take a number, wait in line, go through the scary mystery door, and experience your package being probed before you pay at least 18% duties on it and probably also 18% on the cost of shipping.

Items under 20-25 euros including shipping are exempt, *but the exact amount seems to be variable and they still take FOREVER to arrive. Update Feb 21 2022: NOTHING IS EXEMPT NOTHING ALL GOODS FROM OUTSIDE EU ARE CHARGED DUTIES YOU CAN BUY NOTHING

INCLUDING FROM THE UK AND THE POST-BREXIT SHITSHOW IS SO BAD THAT PACKAGES FROM THE UK HAVE ONLY A 25% CHANCE OF EVEN ENTERING THE TREACHEROUS GERMAN DELIVERY SYSTEM.

If you must go, follow this excellent protocol from yelp user Karim S.:

Both eBay.com and Amazon.com have a “Duties/Import charges” function that sellers can use. If your checkout includes those, and you pay them, your item will arrive fine.

This is the only exception to shipping stuff from the US. eBay’s International Shipping Program is fantastic and now even ensures items from the UK make it here, as previously they never made it. They would just disappear or be returned. (See my post on my hatred of the German postal system here).

Schoeneberg Zollamt detail by Suzanne Forbes June 10 2018Etsy’s function for this doesn’t seem to work properly, etsy sellers aren’t aware or made aware of Germany’s duties, and etsy stuff will be lost in the void or Zoll’d.

Amazon.co.uk also works fine, much better than an ebay.co.uk transaction without the International Shipping process.

If an Amazon.com seller doesn’t list duties/import charges for an item over 20 bucks, they didn’t set up the item sale properly and your stuff will wind up at the Zoll. Don’t risk it.

Just ask your friends to bring you your stuff when they visit. *cough* or your mom who might heroically bring an extra suitcase just of your stuff.

Or buy it from the UK, til Brexit. The equivalent of Target here for cheap good value basic clothes and household furnishings (but only online) is bonprix.de. You can get a LOT of amazing stuff on the eBay.de free classifieds, ebay kleinanzeigen. There are Facebook groups for free stuff and “sell your stuff”. Avoid craigslist, it barely works here. Also, IKEA delivers. Other Nature, the lovely queer sex shop, sells US brands of toys, harnesses, packers etc. which *they* pick up at the Zoll and pay the duties on, specifically so you don’t have to have a creepy violating experience ordering the intimate products you like best.

Just don’t ship stuff from the US.

Well, if you must, you can use MYUS.com, which is a shipping service. You get a shipping address in the States from them, you ship your items there, and they ship your items to Germany. (Or anywhere, I think?) The items arrive at the one FedEx office in Berlin, which is out somewhere near the Zoll, and then FedEx ships them to you. And THEN, a week or a month later, you get a big bill from FedEx for your duties! Which if you don’t pay, will promptly be referred to collections, which you can’t really dodge in Germany, and you’ll pay another 50-75 euros in fees! Not that I know anything about that. Cough.

My Moving to Berlin series:

Basic Needs on Arrival.

Happyfuntimes at the Foreigners’ Registration Bureau!

How to move to Berlin in 2016, Part 1.

Finding a flat in Berlin, in 2015.

How to move to Berlin in 2016 or 2017, part 2: Registration!

Things I HATE about Germany.