oil painting: dayspring in forest

What are basic oil painting art materials?

To learn oil painting, let’s start by understanding the basic question: what is oil painting ? and what are the basic oil painting art materials ?

Oil Painting: 'A man alone'

Oil painting is a paint pigment mixed with oil and applied on canvas considering the colour values, light and shadows to construct a subject. In oil painting the medium used is oil. The basic principle of oil painting is to paint the darkest value first then proceed to paint the lightest values, i.e. dark to light. So to learn oil painting follow this principle. To see more oil painting go to Art-Gallery  -> Oil painting

In order to learn oil painting, one needs to have  basic art materials.

Most beginners get confused when it comes to buying art materials because there are a large variety of colours, brushes, medium and of different brands. 

Oil Painting art materials

  • Oil colour ( best buy colour set of 12 shades )
  • Paint brushes ( buy a set of round brush and a set of flat brush)
  • Linseed oil  (Medium)
  • Turpentine
  • Canvas or oil painting paper 
  • Palette 
  • Easels
  • Rags

Oil Colour or Paint

Oil paints are colour pigments mixed with drying oil such as linseed oil which act as binder and holds the pigments together. The oil paints are technically dried by the oxidation reaction process and it happens when it is exposed to air. That’s why it is called slow-drying type paint. Now to buy the oil paint, it would be better to go for a 12 shade colour set at least. There are a variety of oil colour sets from different brands but make sure that it should have the following colour/ if not it should have an alternative to it.

  • Titanium white
  • Ivory Black
  • Cadmium Yellow deep hue/pal hue
  • Lemon Yellow
  • Yellow Ochre
  • Vermilion Hue/Cadmium red hue
  • Crimson lake/Alizarin Crimson
  • Cobalt blue/ultramarine blue
  • Prussian Blue
  • Sap green
  • Viridian Hue
  • Burnt Sienna

Paint Brushes:

There are many types of brushes available in the market but for beginner it is better for buy two sets of brushes i.e. round brush set and flat brush set.

Round brush set
Flat brush set

Medium:

Medium is a material, which is mixed oil paint to adjust its consistency. There are a variety of mediums available for oil paint. But for beginners it is better to buy linseed oil of 60ml or 75ml. Linseed oil is a slow drying oil therefore the painting will take time to dry based on the quantity of oil used in the painting.

Winsor & Newton linseed oil
Winsor & Newton linseed oil
Camel purified linseed oil

These linseed oils are of the brands ‘ Winsor & Newton’ and ‘Camel’, still there are many other brands for linseed oil check them out if you want to explore more.

There are fast drying mediums as well in the market, Liquin medium is one of them see below reference picture. Since liquin is a fast drying medium, so in order to use it take a small amount of liquin on your palette and close the liquin bottle tightly and repeat the same process whenever you get shortage of liquin on your palette.

Liquin Original
Liquin Original

Turpentine:

It is solvent used for cleaning the oil paint brush. This is a chemical solvent that can easily remove the oil paints from brush and canvas. So do not think of using turpentine as an alternative medium for linseed oil. It will badly spoil the painting.

Turpentine

Canvas or oil painting paper:

Canvas or oil painting paper are the things on which we are going to paint. In general, canvas can be further categorized as Stretched canvas and canvas board. Stretched canvas is a special type of cloth stretched on a wooden frame whereas canvas board is a special type of cloth pasted on a board. There are also papers which are specially made for oil painting. The beginners can go for any one of these options.

Canvas board
Stretched Canvas
Stretched Canvas
Oil painting Paper
Oil painting Paper

Palette:

It is a wooden or plastic board on which artists mix the colours. One can use any plan surface as your palette as long as you see all your colours clearly and able to mix it properly.

Palette

Easels:

Easels are a stand which holds the artist’s canvas for painting. There are different types of easels. But for beginners, it is better to buy a simple designed canvas.

Easel

Rags

Its piece of clothes, on which an artist wipes out the paint brush.

20 thoughts on “What are basic oil painting art materials?”

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