Painting Tutorial - Liquitex Pouring Medium

I told you in the last post that we did a painting project in the studio and it turned out so great that I wanted to share it with you all!  We used Liquitex Pouring Medium, 8 condiment bottles and several colors of acrylic paint.  I also purchased nice canvas panels, as I knew I was planning on hanging these after we were done.  As it turns out, using canvas was good, as paper couldn't have handled the amount of wet work we did!!

all four canvases, in order from start to finish

In the condiment bottles (which I just bought from Wal-mart), pour in the Pouring Medium until about 1/3 full.  Add a few drops of acrylic paint, and shake to mix.  (It's a good idea to let it sit for a day to let all the bubbles get out, but we didn't have too much trouble with that...)  Mix up all your paints so that you can get started easily.

making puddles on the first canvas

Word of Warning:  this stuff is sticky and it runs!  I didn't use gloves, but a pair of disposable gloves would have been handy.  You also need to put down a drop cloth on the floor, if you think you will be super messy.  I did, because I know my 3 yr old isn't always so careful!  And then I laid down layers and layers of newspaper on our worksurface, so that she could make a mess and I wouldn't worry about my table.

After everything is ready, start pouring!  I chose to make bright colors for my daughter to paint with, but you could adjust your palette to any colors you like.  It does run and move, especially if you tilt the canvas, but that is what makes this stuff kind of fun.

I ended up lifting the canvases off of the newspaper after she was done, so that the paint could drip off and the newspaper wouldn't stick to the back of the canvas.  This stuff remains super shiney even after it is totally dry and just makes all the colors so vibrant!  I loved how it looked and even added some to my art journal :)  You can make the paints translucent or opaque and you can blend colors to create whatever colors you would like to use.

4th canvas - you can see her technique began to change

3rd and 4th canvases

It was such a fun project that I really wanted to share it with you all.  My daughter had a blast, and I did too, since I had paint-proofed my new studio a bit.  I think if I were to do it all over again, I'd paint the canvas a background color, since my daughter didn't want to fill the canvas with paint.  She wanted to focus on certain key areas :) If you try this, let me know - I'd love to see pictures!!