When you decide that you would like to paint, you may come up against the myth that it takes talent. Don’t believe it. The desire to learn to paint, coupled with enthusiasm, is what you need more than anything else. You can even learn to paint without being able to draw realistically.
Deciding which paint to use
The first step is to decide what paint you are going to use. The four main choices are oils (traditional or water-soluble), watercolors, acrylics, and pastels. This is a very personal choice: if one type of paint does not suit you, do not hesitate to try another.
Oil painting is a traditional medium of the artist. It is a pigment mixed with oils such as linseed, safflower or poppy oil, and diluted with turpentine. It should be used on substrates that have been primed with gesso to protect the surface – which can even include paper – from the acid in the oil. Oil paint dries slowly, which means the paint can remain wet on the palette and usable on the board for several days, making it easy to mix. Cleaning requires solvents such as turpentine or mineral spirits. Water-soluble oils have been introduced in recent years. Simply use water to thin paints and clean brushes.
There watercolor painting is another traditional medium and uses a pigment mixed with a binder consisting of gum arabic and additives to improve solubility and flow. It is soluble in water, transparent and comes in the form of a tube, a pan or a liquid. Watercolor paint can be reactivated with water when dry and reworked, even years after you have finished your painting. The characteristics of watercolor – its convenience, portability and ease of cleaning – make it a very popular medium for finished works as well as sketchbooks and visual journals.
Acrylic paint is a more modern choice – it was not marketed to artists until the 1950s. In acrylic paints, the pigment is suspended in a plastic polymer. It is especially notable for its fast drying time and can be used on almost any surface without priming. It’s water soluble, making cleanup a breeze (all you’ll need is soap and water). Acrylic dries to a durable, flexible, water-resistant surface. It is very versatile and can be used in a thin layer like watercolors or in a thicker layer like oil paints, depending on the desired effect.
As a budding pastel painter, you’ll likely develop your own favorite brands, but in the meantime, some stand out or are at least worth a try. John Hersey’s hand-crafted Unison pastels are perfect for beginners. With nearly 400 different pastels, sold individually or as coordinated color sets, you can add colors as needed. Schmincke makes the softest pastels on the market: With an almost buttery texture, they glide across the surface of the paper, even on areas that have already been heavily worked. Rembrandt soft pastels are excellent for line work and early layering of colors: they are probably the best pastels to start a painting with.
Learn to mix colors
Beginners are often afraid of color and color mixing (especially when it comes to “color theory”), but the basics of color mixing are not particularly complicated. Color and pigments offer so many different possibilities and nuances that an artist could spend a lifetime exploring color, color theory and color mixing. Indeed, color mixing is a subject that often overwhelms beginners because it can be complicated, but color mixing can also be boiled down to a few fundamental tips
So, take the challenge, learn, and soon you will be mixing the right shades, tones and shades. And, if you don’t want to waste paint by throwing it away, use it with white to make a monochrome painting or value exercise. Value is another term for tone, which refers to the clarity or intensity of colors. So a valuable exercise is to work to create lighter or darker tones in your painting.
Stages of creating a painting
The stages of creating a painting vary from artist to artist and develop over time. Many artists make a light sketch of the composition on a canvas and then block out the main areas of color on the canvas. You can start with the larger shapes and move on to the smaller ones, gradually working on the details. Some artists work in layers and others work alla prima (in one go) to complete their painting in one sitting. Artists often make studies (small versions) or several sketches for a painting. There is no right or wrong approach; Ultimately, you have to find what works best for you.