Artist Blog #5
An art blog on how to varnish painting artwork on canvas. It gives you everything you need to know to varnish oil and acrylic paintings.
Varnishing your piece of painted art is crucial in the longevity of your creation.
Hi everyone, welcome back.
Here I will explain what exactly varnish is, what types of varnish are available, when to varnish, how to varnish and I will also tell you what products I personally use and recommend.
So What is Varnish?
- Varnish is a clear layer applied to a fully dried piece of work,
- Varnishes for oil paintings are made from a resin suspended in a solvent,
- Varnishes for acrylic paintings are made from acrylic polymer emulsions.
The Types of Varnish
- Varnish comes in glossy, matt and satin. It is down to your own preference what finish you want to achieve. You may want to experiment with all three to see which one works for you and your artwork,
- You could mix two together to create a specific finish.
Why Varnish?
- It prevents the painting from dust particles, UV rays, normal wear and tear and the colours are less likely to fade over time,
- It gives a more unified finish to the various areas of the painting,
- It allows the painting to be more easily cleaned,
- It increases the colour saturation and the colours look more rich and beautiful,
- It deepens the colour contrasts,
- Moisture cannot get to your painting.
How to Varnish?
- Use a flat, wide and soft brush or flat sponge,
- Use sweeping strokes across the painting going from one side to the next to ensure you are covering the whole painting evenly,
- Do not keep brushing over the same area,
- Put some light onto the painting so you can see any areas you may have missed,
- Choose a dust free area when varnishing and keep windows and doors closed to prevent children, pets and anything else coming into contact with the varnished painting,
- use the brush or sponge for varnishing only otherwise if you’re painting with it as well there will be a chance that old paint pigments may come off in the varnishing process and stick to the painting,
- keep the work on a flat surface whilst varnishing and drying,
- Remove any bubbles,
- Apply 1-3 coats,
- Drying times for varnish is usually 18 to 24 hours. Always look at the manufacturers guidelines,
- With each layer apply it by going across at a right angle. This will help even all layers out,
- Wipe the painting with a lint free cloth beforehand to get rid of dust,
- Place something underneath the canvas at the cross section of the stretcher bars or at the under the corners of the inside of the frame to raise it from the flat surface so the varnish from the sides cannot stick to anything as it dries,
- Pour out some varnish in a shallow and clean dish,
- If your painting has areas of heavy texture, then I’d recommend using a spray varnish instead. If you were to use a liquid varnish then it will create pools of varnish in the textured areas,
- If you use a matt varnish and it’s not properly mixed beforehand then it can leave a milky white finish to your painting and is particularly noticeable over black areas,
- Leave the painting flat until the varnish is dry to the touch. Once it is touch dry you can lean it against the wall with the painted side downwards facing the wall so as to prevent dust particles from settling into the varnish while it proceeds to dry.
When to Varnish?
- Varnish once you have photographed your artwork for social media, your website and for prints. This is very important because once it is varnished the painting will become reflective and it will be very difficult to get a good image of your painting due to the reflective glare,
- Ensure your painting is fully dry before you begin to varnish. The drying times depends on whether you’ve used acrylic or oil paints, he thickness of paint plus the humidity of the environment,
- The longest time it can take to dry is up to a month with acrylic paints and years with oils. Now this is worse case and it depends on the previous points that I mentioned,
- For me, I leave my acrylic paintings at least 2 weeks before varnishing and probably the same amount of time for my oil paintings too. I can do this because I use Gamblin Galkyd medium mixed in with my oil paints which speeds up the drying time immensely and I do not use impasto like layers with my paint. The manufacturers say that oil paint, when using Galkyd, dries within 1-2 days if the layers are not thick.
Recommended Varnish
I recommend Gamblin Gamvar Gloss varnish which you can use on both acrylic and oil paintings.
To purchase any of the materials I use for your own beautiful creations then click here
Click on the button below to watch my artist vlog #5.
It shows my painting process of painting 13 of my art portfolio, what has inspired me this week and information on varnishing your painting in video format.
Artist Blog #3
artist blog #3 - creating painting 10 of my art portfolio
I’ve named this collection Illuminance.
Hi and welcome,
Building momentum with my 30 painting portfolio has been slow but I am moving forwards which is exactly where I want to be headed. Take a look at the art supplies I use for all my mixed media artwork.
I’ve named this collection Illuminance.
My intention with all these paintings is to have a commonality throughout them all. One of these common threads is the subject matter. If you’ve been following my work for a while you may have noticed that the majority of all my art that I have ever created right from the beginning have all included a forest, woodland, trees and most of the time streams or a pool of water within a wooded area. There is something that clearly draws me time and time again to paint such scenes. I think it’s because of how I feel when I am in that space…I feel so at peace and an expansion happens within me. So painting such scenes reminds me of this feeling. It speaks to my soul.
What business aspects have I been working on?
This week I took a course via Skillshare to learn how best to use Pinterest for business and how to implement a Pinterest marketing strategy. I know Pinterest is a great platform to drive traffic to your website or wherever you want your customers to end up. For me, I want them to mainly end up at my website and equally to my YouTube channel. A secondary direction for my customers to head to would be to my Instagram account but that is not going to be my main focus. This week I created a variety of Pinterest pins for my art blogs, artwork that is available to purchase and my vlogs. The pin templates were created on Canva. Canva is incredibly useful and I use it for so many things, such as my Youtube thumbnails, end and intro videos, pins for Pinterest and Instagram posts. This week I also signed up to Tailwind which is an app that will schedule these pins to be posted throughout the days, weeks and months. This will save me a lot of time in the end. So after some research on how to best use Pinterest I now have a better understanding of this platform. I have used Pinterest before for my business but I was using it infrequently which doesn’t do much with the traction you get if you were to have a more consistent approach. I am aiming to upload pins daily via Tailwind and I will be keeping an eye on the stats to see which pins or more successful than others and build the pins refinement that way. So watch this space!
Capturing this beautiful day out in Woodbridge.
It’s good to recharge your energy with being outside by the water or amongst the woods.
Work in progress of painting 10 of my portfolio.
I found at this stage the painting looked flat so I ended up lightening the background to create distance which ended up improving the depth immensely. The link above will take you to my vlog with the whole process.
Artist Blog #2
My Art Blog - creating my artist portfolio of 30 paintings before my art exhibition, including my art vlog on Youtube
An earlier piece that I created during lockdown. It’s when my focus on building my art business went up a notch
Hello everyone,
Finding something that you’re passionate about can take time to present itself into your life and awareness.
To find a passion in life the majority of people will need to try their hand at many different things before something clicks inside of them and they realise that they do not want to do anything else. It’s like finding a key to your own unique lock and that key will bring with it immense joy, excitement and it will make you feel alive.
Soon after I had my daughter, I felt a shift within my core. My capacity to love blossomed to new heights and so did the need to be creative and the need to find a purpose or a passion.
The pull to be creative took me down many paths but in January 2016 I purchased three small canvases and some acrylic paint and I followed my intuition. I painted a silhouette of an old and crooked tree on each canvas with a beautiful purple and red sky in the background. I was both so happy and surprised with how they turned out. A family member purchased them soon after I had posted them on Instagram and that gave me the confidence I needed to pursue this new interest of mine.
During those earlier years I was learning to paint by watching tutorials online and by simply experimenting and being playful. It was a casual hobby up until 2020.
Lockdown was the catalyst for me wanting to be a full-time artist.
During this period I was able to paint nearly every day and having that time at home also allowed me to build my website from scratch. This was a huge achievement for me as I have always believed that I was not very savvy when it comes to things like that. I had now created half a dozen finished pieces of art, sold some of them via social media and now I had my own website to sell them from. I was now determined to give this my all and create a living from my art because So even though lockdown was difficult and stressful in ways, such as not being able to go to work and earn money, worrying about paying bills and how this pandemic and isolation was affecting my daughter and family, it also changed the course of my life without a doubt, for the better.
Painting I created during lockdown
This piece sold pretty quickly and it cemented the dream of being a full-time artist
It also opened me up to new and powerful realisations including first hand spiritual experiences. Which I will talk about another time.
The following year in June 2021 I enrolled onto an art mastery program for a year. I had come to a point in my painting journey where I needed guidance to improve my skills further. So after much debating I took the plunge and signed up for this intensive art program. Best thing I ever did!
The course ended in June 2022, however I am yet to complete my portfolio of 30 paintings. I am currently on painting 10. Once my portfolio is finished my intention is to showcase my work at my first exhibition. Take a look at the art supplies I use for all my mixed media artwork.
These blogs of my portfolio progress will be a regular thing!
Artist Blog #1
My First Ever Art Vlog - behind the scenes in my life as I build an art business and painting from my art studio
Creating my pieces of artwork with many materials gives me a beautiful sense of freedom and possibility.
Hey everyone,
So I have decided to document my art career from the very beginning in the form of blogs and vlogs and to share with you this never-ending adventure which is spirituality.
Why am I doing this? Well, my goal is to build a like minded and supportive community and to also inspire others who also dream big.
It’s not an easy task to build a business of any kind. It’s even trickier when you are doing this whilst working a full-time job and/or being a parent etc. But it is not impossible!
I believe that it takes focus, dedication, self discipline and being consistent. These are the main qualities I strive to embrace every single day.
The vlogs will encourage me to stick to deadlines and personal goals so that I build some momentum with the limited spare time I have to put into my art business. It will also encourage me to commit to a daily spiritual practice, which I know will benefit many aspects of my life.
Both art and spirituality came into my life significantly in early 2020.
I have written about my spiritual experiences in my other blog posts, which I hope you will also enjoy!
So a little bit about me…I am a mum to a teenager Isabella and we have a cat called Charlie.
I currently work full-time as someone who offers support to people in my local community with household chores or in a more caring capacity. It’s a business I began a few years ago and even though I enjoy what I do and it has served me all, it is not something that I feel I am here to do.
How do I know what I am supposed to do with this life?
The simple answer is to follow whatever it is that brings that fire in your belly and that expansion and excitement in your heart. The thing that you simply cannot imagine not doing. I believe it is our guidance system.
I hope you enjoy the vlogs and find them useful in some way for your own creative endeavour.
Take a look at the art supplies I use for all my mixed media artwork.