Day 2: Our Favorite Things-Art Supplies Series: Acrylic Paints!

 Welcome to day 2 of "Our  Favorite Things - Art Supplies!" Series.  In no particular order; Jodi, Penny, and Jean will take turns sharing a few of their creative must-haves.

Happy Friday!  Jodi Here, carrying on with  our ReMe art supply love fest, day 2.

While I don’t have any pics of myself at age  5 or so to prove it, I believe my love affair with paint began one  sunny day while attending the  church pre-school.  I specifically remember me standing in front of an easel, dressed in my paint splattered smock admiring my abstract work that resembled a banana floating over blobs of color.   (My abstracts have changed only slightly since that time...heehee ;)

 (My abstracts have changed only slightly since that time...heehee ;)

“It’s brilliant!” the teacher said.  I happily agreed. 

It was perhaps the first spark of motivation that I needed to embark into a variety of painting endeavors while young.  Paint by numbers.  Coloring books that had watercolors embedded in the bottom of the pages.  Later on in middle school and high school, I clearly remember gigantic jars of cheap acrylic paint that looked good enough to eat.  And then like many,  my interests diverted to other things, some creative and some more ‘practical’.  Music, drawing, writing, and then I stopped it all for working in the field of retail management and banking.   Diversion or no diversion, the love for painting never completely died, it was simply put to rest until it was ready to come out again. 

When we first started talking here at “ReMe” about doing a favorite supply count down, without hesitation, my first supply that came to mind that I can’t live without is Acrylic paint.    The type of acrylics that I favor have changed over the years.   Having grown in my own skills and knowledge of what makes a great paint.  I truly appreciate the depth of color and the vibrancy of professional grade acrylics, despite the higher costs.  It's worth it.  Spend the extra bit of money for the vibrancy of color!      Without a doubt, there is no comparing the lush creamy pigments of a bold soft body paint. It's hard to resist colors that dance off the canvas. There are some pigments that practically sing with joy they minute they hit your substrate!  I’m in love with the sheerness of transparent fluid acrylics and have a penchant for the man made colors of the Quinicridone and Phthalo family.         When feeling playful and looking for additional ‘jazz’ to liven up my work, the shimmery quality of acrylics mixed with mica flakes in the Silks Acrylics are perfect to grab.

Some of the many fabulous Silks Acrylics that I'm enamored with.

Can you tell that these are well loved and certainly very much used little soldiers?  How I love me some Golden Paints!

I love the creamy soft body acrylics that Liquitex creates.  Yum Yum.

When you love something, just go BIG. I love Matisse paints too and have found it's just more economical to go big when you use a ton of  the colors.   Here you see just a glimpse of my table. As you can see, it's full of fun supplies and must have tools :)

I love to get my fingers into the paint.

I love the fact that acrylics are versatile and can be transformed by glazes, washes, stains, and embodied with textures while mixing in mediums.  Whether layering, scratching into, writing over, building up texture, mixing together, scraping, brushing or dripping, I’m in my happy place with acrylics.

Some of my favorite brands are Golden, Matisse, and Liquitex, and Colourarte.  If I had to choose 4 or 5 or 6 , or 15 colors that are my current favorite here they are :  Aqua Green Light (Matisse),  Permanent Violet Dark (Golden),  Australian Sienna (Matisse),  Baltic Green (Liquitex),  Green Gold (Golden),  Cobalt Teal (Matisse), Light Blue Violet (Liquitex),  Quinicridone Magenta (Golden),  Diarylide Yellow  (Golden);  Olive vine Green, Ginger Peach,  Key Lime,  Plumeria,  Snap Dragon,  Cinnamon Brown  (all Colourarte Silks Acrylics).

I’m just looking at my table right now and it’s fairly obscene how many colors of paint I own.

Who am I kidding, it’s hard to choose one color that is my 

favorite or just a few. 

One of my new abstracts...here you see several of my favorite colors in their glory and mixed with each other to come up with my own signature palette of colors.

Here you can see that my students have a love of color, too.  All across the country, I've had the blessing to be surrounded by eager students and art enthusiast that share an affinity of color and texture in their acrylic painting journey.

I hope you had some teacher, friend, family member or even total stranger tell you that you are brilliant and have a touch of magic in what you do.  It can lead you on an amazing journey of discovery and passion for that thing that will make your heart spill over in happiness.

As you can see here, one of the first affirmations I received at the age of 5 (whether it was truly warranted or not) has led to some great experiences and an ever growing love for art supplies and all things creative.

So for your question, tell me what colors are you in love with at the moment and 

brands?  Tell us who you are ‘seeing’ this week!

For your chance to win our Fabulous ReMe Favorites Prize Package, please post your answer to the question below in the comments section.  You'll also earn an extra entry for each time you share this post on social media.  Just be sure to post a link to your share here for us to count your extra entries.  (All entries must be received by 12:00 Noon, EST, on September 3, 2015.)

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BTW-----We would LOVE for you to be with us for our flagship ReMe retreat on Ocracoke Island .


There’s still time to join us on Ocracoke in October!

Please use the link on the left side of this page to register.

When the link disappears, we’re full to capacity.

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