Painting a Small Acrylic Portrait - Free Lesson with Lucy Cooke One 5 x 7 inch Ampersand Gessobord (or any small painting surface, gessoed watercolor paper or any small stretched canvas or canvas panel) Clear Gesso (for preparing surface of gessobord) Acrylic paints I love to use (but please use what you have for this lesson)

Liquitex Heavy Body Red Oxide Liquitex Soft Body Burnt Sienna Liquitex Soft Body Cadmium Yellow Medium Hue Liquitex Soft Body Yellow Ocher Liquitex Soft Body Cadmium Red Medium Hue or Napthol Crimson Liquitex Soft Body Prussian Blue Liquitex Soft Body Raw Umber Liquitex Soft Body Cerulean Blue Hue Liquitex Soft Body Emerald Green Liquitex Soft Body Burnt Umber Golden Payne’s Gray Golden Cobalt Turquoise (I am using a fluid acrylic in this video) I use my Liquitex Black Gesso as my darkest black paint Liquitex Soft Body Titanium White Brushes

I LOVE the Princeton Catalyst line of brushes, I order them from Dick Blick or Jerry’s Artarama My favorites are the Bright brushes…they have a flat edge to them. I mostly use the short handle Bright Shaders 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and Bright brush 12. Use what you are comfortable with. Very rarely do I use a round tip brush for my acrylic portraits. But I do use small detail brushes for the eyes, Size 0. It also works well for my scribbly marks in the portrait. For preparing the gessobord or canvas before painting the portrait, I used a mixture of Raw or Burnt Umber and a touch of red acrylic paint. Mix these paints with Liquitex Clear Gesso, and spread it around the gessobord or canvas with a large brush. Let dry completely before starting to paint the portrait. It gives a nice “tooth” on which to paint on. Ampersand gessobords can be pretty slick, so a gesso ground is recommended. Make sure to sign your finished work! To varnish the portrait, I use a thin layer of Acrylic Matte Medium (I use Liquitex or Golden brand) over the whole painting. Let it dry 24 to 48 hours. Then add a thin coat of Dorland’s Wax Varnish with a clean rag, in a circular motion over the entire painting and sides of canvas. Let dry overnight, then buff with a clean microfiber or cotton cloth. This will protect your painting, as well as give the painting a lovely medium sheen to it.

I hope you had fun…thank you for joining me today! Keep creating! Lucy Cooke ArtcyLucyStudio.com