an Acrylic Blending technique?

Hello, while searching in some Acrylic painting books for techniques on blending. I found two artists that mentioned a technique called 'scrubbing'. Samples of their work looked nice. Does anyone know about this technique...can you give me details on it?

Thanks,

says...

I've never seen this as an art term, but then I need to ask - are you reading books in other English speaking venues than the USA? If you're in the UK, they have some really weird terms not often heard here in the colonies.

Or could you be misconstruing 'scumbling?' Scumbling I can give you references for.

In my limited and unschooled understanding, 'scrubbing' is a technique in Acrylic painting for moving around or lifting paint. There are different versions for oil and watercolor, but when the term is used for an acrylic technique it *usually* refers to a method that is somewhat similar to scumbling (the use of semi-disorganized strokes overlapping in different directions to create the illusion of clouds, brush, grass, etc.) except that the strokes are done in a more uniform way in either horizontal or vertical patterns, but not both. This is considered an oil technique, and it would by typically used to mix two wet colors at their boundary, thus creating a soft edge. It can also be used as a dry brush technique with a reasonably stiff bristle brush, and this too gives a nice soft edge.

Now I said 'usually' because sometimes people use the term 'scrubbing' as it's used in watercolors: In that case, the damp brush (or a sponge or paper towel) is scribbled or scrubbed at a blending point (such as gray clouds next to blue sky) and some of the color pushed around and some of it is literally scrubbed or lifted off. Since you can use both oil and watercolor techniques with acrylic paint, a person *might* mean the term either way, although the two are close enough in meaning that I'm sure you can get the idea without any problem.

You will have a hard time. The trick is a retarder that works but also a change in the viscosity.

Oil blends while acrylic crawls up the brush when a long blend is attempted. This leaves blank pits where the brush bites through the paint.

Also, fine glazes are impossible to control because thin layers dry much faster.

Many artists have solved these problems but few talk about it. I have never found anything in a book that describes how to duplicate an oil blend.

A good test to whether you are successful is to duplicate a long air brush blend. The trouble with airbrush is that it lacks variation, what I call staccato, a quality found in all the finest classical work.

If you can't properly temper acrylic it will end up looking dirty, schmiery and will end up ruining your brushes and looking like web site impressionism.

...no skill no art... Tired of Modern Art? Check out my web page

I have used a magnifying glass to inspect the original of Colville's PEI (acrylic) - in the National Gallery - the flesh blends are composed of very small dots of differing tints. They blend together when standing at a reasonable distance from the painting.

keith

I guess that's the the first time you looked closely at a painting. Try looking closly at yours, you might just see how bad they really are.

Gee, isn't that amazing. Tempera and acrylic can't generally be used for long blends. I guess you didn't learn that in the schmier academy you attended.

...no skill no art... Tired of Modern Art? Check out my web page

I have not met an artist worth his or her salt who did not think their next work would be better. Over the years I have come to realise that you are the ultimate in perfection. No improvement in your greatness is possible. If my knees were not so bad I would worship at the alter of your greatness. Please forgive me for neglecting this ancient act of submission to your great personage.

Your humble servant: always ready to please my master: keith

First of all, congratulations on completing high school. I hope you're headed for college.

Oil paints don't take 'forever to dry' any more than acrylics 'dry too fast.' It's all in knowing how to modify the chemistry to achieve the results you want. Oil paints can be made to dry nearly as fast as acrylics if you use accelerators, or the newer alkyd based mediums.

Rubbing with a paper towel or Q-tip dipped in rubbing alcohol will disolve selected areas of acrylic paint... excellent when there are many layers of varying colors... also when you need to 'erase' a mistake.

It's also a great brush cleaner. But you knew that.

Maybe I should know this, but I didn't. Thanks Leigh!

I think I know what "scrubbing" means. It's a method of brushwork whereby the artist puts the brush at about a 45 degree angle to the canvas and, with firm pressure, scrubs the brush back and forth, pushing the paint into the canvas and trying to repeat this movement in every direction until the paint is evenly spread out and thinly dispersed. It would be the exact opposite of impasto painting, in which the artist tries to create thick layers of paint with visible brush marks. It is very much like using the brush the way one might use a brillo pad or sponge--back and forth, up and down, with firm pressure. Scrubbing can be used to build layers, glaze one color over another, or thin out a color that seems to heavy or strong for a certain passage of the painting. Scrubbing with acrylic paint works especially well if you add some extra heavy gloss gel to the paint. It speeds drying, and it adds weight to each layer. For some reason I am still trying to understand, scrubbing works better on smooth surfaces. It works much better for me on acrylic canvas paper than on actual canvas! Perhaps the tooth of the canvas is taking in too much of the paint's texture, absorbing it, if you will, and taking more time, therefore, to build a "foundation" for further scrubbing. I did a "scrubbed" acrylic painting the other day on Canson's Brand "Canva Paper"; it was one of the best I have ever done, and I've been painting for almost ten years. The key is to use a very heavy fast-drying gel medium, mixed half and half with the paint, then to use little bits of paint (don't load up the brush; just wet the end or drag the brush repeatedly through a thin pile of paint to ensure that only a minimal amount gets on the bristle). Use a very stiff brush, too: the best are probably flats or filberts, but make sure they are very stiff, or the brush will not be able to stand up to the repeated pressure of the rapid back and forth movements. Also, make sure not to wet the paint with water. You don't want the paint diluted; if it is, it will not build layers quickly enough, and you'll wind up scrubbing something that looks more like a watercolor. Of course, you can do that if you want to, but just know the difference first. The heavy gel is very important. I use Liquitex Super Heavy Gloss gel. It dries almost as quickly as it takes for me to scrub out one brush-load of paint. Thinly applied, it dries so rapidly, that over-painting is a thing of ease. You begin to see the paint pile up and "crust." Thick layers start to form, and you begin to see something like (excuse the strange analogy) "translucent concrete." I hope this helps. Let me know.