Re: How do you clean your brush after using Oil Paints

In Reply to: How do you clean your brush after using Oil Paints posted by Polymus on 08/26/00 at 12:58 PM:

: I am just getting started with oil paints, never used them before, and my brushes are being destroyed by them.If anyone can help me out here please do.
: Polymus

I have found that the best way to keep brushes supple and prolong their use life is to not clean them at all, but to keep your bristle brushes in a large coffee can filled with non-drying cooking oil. Before you use them you simply squeeze out the cooking oil onto a paper towel. The finer brushes such as the sables need to be suspended in the cooking oil using a spring brush holder or some such device as they can be bent by contact with the bottom of the can. Turps and other solvents can burn up brushes, but soap and water (even mild soap) can dry out the bristles by removing the natural oils from them.
If it is worth anything, this method of preserving brushes in oil was the method recommended in the old writings on oll painting technique. It has the added advantage of requiring less time. You may be concerned that there is some residue of old paint still left in the brush after squeezing the brush onto a paper towel; you might try dipping the brush in the cooking oil again and squeezing again to remove this residue. Not enough of the nondrying oil resides in the brush to create a problem.
Re: How do you clean your brush after using Oil Paints Tim Kangas   Posted at: 09/16/00 (1)
Re: How do you clean your brush after using Oil Paints James Morton
 
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