Acrylic Paint: Exciting, Dynamic, and More Sustainable

Artist painting in a bright studio, holding a palette filled with vibrant acrylic paints. The canvas reveals layers of abstract shapes, showcasing the dynamic and sustainable nature of acrylic paint.

From Oil to Acrylic: A Conscious Choice
During my time at art school, I primarily worked with oil paint. It’s a beautiful medium, offering nearly endless possibilities for mixing and blending colors. You can keep reworking, shifting, and adjusting – perfect for letting ideas mature on the canvas. It feels like a safe haven, a technique that allows room for perfection.

However, over time, I’ve increasingly been drawn to acrylic paint. Why? Because acrylic challenges me in entirely different ways. While oil paint gives you time to correct mistakes, acrylic forces you to be precise. It requires a different focus: working in layers, making quick decisions, and creating optical blends instead of endlessly smoothing colors together.

Acrylic Paint: Exciting, Dynamic, and More Sustainable
Acrylic paint offers a dynamism that keeps me inspired. Every layer tells a story and contributes to the depth and intensity of my work. The quick drying time makes it a demanding yet liberating medium: it pushes me to work intuitively, take risks, and connect directly with the moment.

Additionally, acrylic paint is a more sustainable alternative. Oil paint often requires chemical cleaning agents like turpentine, which can be harmful to the environment and health. Acrylic, on the other hand, can be cleaned with just water and soap. I also produce less waste and fewer fumes in my studio, making the process not only more eco-friendly but also more pleasant.

From Safe to Challenging
For me, acrylic is a more challenging medium. It keeps me sharp and infuses my work with an energy that aligns with my style and personality. Every brushstroke must be deliberate, and every color choice matters. It’s not just a technical challenge but an artistic one: how do you convey depth, movement, and emotion within the constraints – and possibilities – of acrylic paint?

Art That Lives and Cares
My choice for acrylic paint translates into artworks that are alive. The dynamic layers and vibrant colors draw attention and tell stories that emerge from both conscious and subconscious inspiration. At the same time, each piece contributes to a more sustainable process, which has become increasingly important to me. Art is not just an expression of what I feel, but also a reflection of the world we live in – and how we can take better care of it.

High-Quality Acrylic Paint: Which Brands Do I Primarily Use?

  • Ara Acrylic Paint
    Ara acrylic paint was specially developed for the Rietveld Academy. It is a highly professional artist-grade acrylic paint made with the finest lightfast pigments and a 100% acrylic emulsion. This fine artist-quality paint features exceptional hues and is crafted in the Netherlands by Old Holland Classic Colours (The Paint of the Old Masters).
  • Golden Acrylics Heavy Body
    Golden Acrylics Heavy Body paint is of absolute top quality. It consists solely of pigments mixed with an acrylic emulsion, without solvents, gloss agents, or other additives. As a result, it contains the maximum pigment concentration. Due to the absence of additives, each color has its own degree of matte finish. The paint has an extra firm, buttery consistency, making it perfect for those who love working with a lot of texture, such as brushstrokes or palette knives.
  • Lascaux Studio
    The professional Lascaux Studio acrylic paint range consists of 50 pure base colors, each with remarkable color depth. Lascaux Studio contains the same high-quality binder as the Artist series (acrylate-based) but has a more thickly fluid consistency instead of a paste-like one. The Studio acrylic paint dries to a satin matte finish and, thanks to its high pigment concentration, is economical to use. It is highly to maximally lightfast.

Want to know more about the materials I use? Read more here.

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Hesther van Doornum

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Hesther van Doornum