Six Qualities That Make an Oil Paint a Good Oil Paint - All Brands Are Not the Same

Over the years I've had the chance to use a lot of oil paint brands. As my painting style changes, I often look for new properties from the paints I use. When I first started using pallet knives, I needed to find affordable, good quality oils to work with. Now that I'm a fully professional artist, it's even more important that the quality of the paint I use is reliable, consistent, vibrant and good value.Read More ...

Contemporary Impressionist Art: The Basics of How To Paint Like The Masters

Have you wondered how the great impressionist painters achieved such emotion and atmosphere in what can sometimes look to be a very simple painting? This article outlines the basic concept from mapping the idea to allowing your inner impressionism to flow from your finger tips. Whether you plan to us oil or acrylic paints on paper or canvas, this article will help you get started as a contemporary artist in the modern impressionist genre. Read More ...

Impressionism in Colour: Generate Atmosphere and Depth With These Impressionist Painting Techniques

The atmosphere and sensual emotion you see in modern impressionist paintings and feel when looking at contemporary impressionist artwork owes itself in large part to the colours used. This may seem obvious and to some extent it is. However, since the colours and ‘warmth’ in the painting are generally exaggerated in impressionist art, it’s worth taking a little time to understand how you can use colour to best effect. In this article, I’m going to step you through some of the basics so you’ve already got a foot on the ladder when you start your next impressionist masterpiece. Read More ...

Balancing a Painting: How To Choose The Colour Values That Will Make Your Contemporary Impressionist Art Work?

In this, the 3rd article in my series relating to contemporary impressionist painting techniques, I’m talking about a concept as equally important as colour and I believe more difficult to grasp. That is balance. Although it’s not an issue specific to impressionist art, it can be more difficult to get right if you are making use of the full spectrum of colours available to you. It is also a very important factor to consider and hence it deserves its own article.Read More ...