by Elizabeth M Young

Created on: September 27, 2010

Oil paint is considered to be a dinosaur of the painter's world, but is not obsolete by any stretch of the imagination. There is something special about the smell of the paint, the mediums used to change the nature of the paint, and the way in which it goes onto the canvas or board that is special.  Working with oils makes painters feel as if they are at home and in touch with those great painters who came before them.

Oil paint is versatile, as it can be thinned to a watercolor consistency, applied thickly to create texture and raised surfaces, and thinned with oil media to create translucent or transparent glazes. And the glazing process is where oil paint has superiority to acrylic paint. The glazing ability in oil somehow creates richer and deeper effects than can be achieved with acrylic paint and varnish.

While acrylics allow application of what is essentially pigmented plastic that can do what oil can do and more, there is the issue of drying speed. While acrylics allow for super quick drying that allows for a finished, dry picture in a couple of days or less, the medium, itself, is difficult to keep wet and viable.

This requires that the artist work with speed, especially when working outside or when trying to lay out enough of a special color to last for several sessions. Acrylic paint  dries quickly on the palette and when it does, it is not going to restore to a liquid state. If there is a hard fought for, custom mixed color involved, there must be enough of it in sealed containers to allow for breaks of any length. As a result of the fast drying, a lot of acrylic paint can be wasted once it dries thoroughly enough to turn into a solid mass of water insoluble plastic.

Oil, on the other hand, stays wet and viable on the palette, allowing for breaks where the paint can be left for a much longer time between sessions or when an interruption occurs. With the new synthetic colors, in combination with the traditional and natural colors, there is very little to prevent a vibrant, lively color palette or an earthy, natural palette where the colors are more true to life and to natural scenes.

Since oil paints can have a variety of pigment loads, students can work with the cheaper student grade oils that have somewhat less of a pigment load. In addition, artists can mix their own oil colors, arriving at a pigment load and combination of oils that give the workability that they desire.

 But, otherwise, there is no shortage of vibrant and rich color, along with rich fast and slower drying mediums that allow for a much more measured, mannered and leisurely oil painting experience than we get with acrylics.

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