As far as I have understand about oil paintings and other choices of color painting media, the duration to completely dry an oil painting is longer than one can expect. Unlike acrylic paint, it dry much faster. The slow drying process for oil color could be an advantage to allow artists to work on it for many sessions. On the other hand, it could be frustrating for the final wait of drying oil painting before you able to frame it up.
You would had been done your artwork with painstaking attention, yet drying is another pressing issues for beginners who uses oil color. Waiting time may take even weeks to dry. So what takes oil painting so long time to dry?
For simple fact that oil do not dry by evaporation. The drying of oils is the result of an oxidative reaction, chemically equivalent to slow, flameless combustion. The thicker the coat of paint, the longer the waiting time will be. Having said that, there are 3 basic methods to shorten drying process. Namely, paint with thin layers, use paints ground in linseed oil, and use drying additives.
- Painting thin layers allows oxidation to permeate into oil layers easier, than thick or multiple layers on top of one another. Thus, shorter time is achieved and it also an added advantage for painting more layers on dryer oil surface.
- Linseed oil is made from the seeds of the flax plant. It is available in refined and cold-pressed oil. Beside a better and faster drying oil, it also has adds gloss and transparency to paints. It dries very thoroughly, making it’s ideal for under-painting and initial layers in a painting.
- Cobalt Driers are extremely powerful oxidizing agent. The adverse effect of using this addictive may affect the color of mixtures. So it is advisable to use it sparely. If used in excess they can ruin a painting. Most experienced painters would agree that not more than 5 drops of cobalt drier should be used per each 2 1/2 fluid Oz of any given medium. Basically Cobalt Driers are diluted in the oil painting medium if you are using one. It is harder to control the amount of drier, if directly into the blobs of paint on the palette. In short, Cobalt Driers are used to improve and speed the drying rate of oil colors.
Whatever the methods to increase the rate of drying oil painting, I would say having good patience is still the key factor in learning any art disciplines.
Tags: Basic, Beginner, How-to, Oil Painting
Adding to last week topic on Chinese calligraphy painting, I thought it will be good idea to illustrate further about writing text on an oil painting artwork. I did some searching and hoping to compile a summary of what I have learn and share it on my blog. However, to what I have realized is not about the content, but about someone who has been an active contributor in Yahoo Answers. Her name appeared as “Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao” Member since April 07, 2007. In her profile, she mentioned that she is a professional acrylic artist and have 40 years of art painting experience under her belt. By her name, she is a Vietnamese artist. I would be interested to find out more about her work and perhaps invite her for a guest’s post.
Ok, back to the topic of the title today: how to add text to oil painting? You may be interested to read it here, which was also the answer by Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao. Or do you have a better answer than her?
Who is Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao?