Category: Tips and Studies

Glop, goo, and jelly

I’ve never understood the fascination with thick, viscous oil painting mediums. Used for special effects, such mediums are perfectly fine, but for everyday work they are completely useless. I scratch my head whenever I see recipes based wholly on balsams or thickened oils–goo.  Closely related to the goos are the jelly-like mediums–the glops. There are a…

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Tom Hudson

I was taught nothing of practical use about painting when I was a student. Worse than the daily dose of esoteric BS was the relentless, sneering attack on the subjects of technique and history, which were held in utter contempt. Pollack, so I was lectured, allowed his brushes to dry in cans of house paint, which he drizzled from stiff bristles onto unprimmed canvas on the floor. If that was good enough for him, it’s good enough for you–so said they. I wrote elsewhere about one professor’s favorite piece of painting gear–fishing boots. My artistic education can be summed up this way: daily attempt by inept professors to destroy the same clumsily constructed straw man. No questioning the received dogma; that was the way it was–and worse

Rubbish–worse than rubbish. Not only not true, not even important to the discussion–mere fashion. Worst of of all, it was all served up without the least bit of humor.

[Rant End]

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Tom Hudson

Someone asked if I inadvertently omitted straight-from-the-tube black from my palette. The omission wasn’t inadvertent. I don’t use ivory black (or any other black) ‘as is.’ Ivory black is too cold to use as is, but not cold enough for a truly cold black, which is why I create the mixtures illustrated in the linked post. Ivory black + ultramarine blue for cool black, and ivory black + burnt umber for a neutral black. For warmth, I add more burnt umber or, more typically, use burnt umber + cobalt (or cerulean) blue.

Palettes

Here is my general. all-purpose palette. It has a good assortment of every color group and the core neutrals I always mix. You can do just fine with fewer colors–three or even fewer from each group is certainly workable. When I was younger, I had a very limited palette because I had a very limited…

Old Brushes

Sigh…time to retire some old brushes. I hang on to things too long: brushes, paint, oils, mediums, friends. But too frequently I’ve reached for a brush while in the middle of a painting session only to retrieve one of these old boys–far past their useful lives. So I’ve retired these tired old brushes. I won’t throw…

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Tom Hudson

I’ve updated the Oil Paint Brand listing with new ratings and comments.