White, clear and tinted techniques with Acrylic Gesso

Hello, I want to show you why priming a canvas is important to preserve your work and to prevent paint from sinking into the support. When using oils you must always prime the canvas. Although acrylic can be applied directly to unprimed canvas, priming will prevent paint from sinking in. I’m priming a quarter of the canvas with Winsor & Newton Professional Acrylic White Gesso, it’s a very popular primer. You should always apply 2-3 coats, here I’m applying the final coat – which gives you a brilliant white archival ground to work on. Winsor & Newton also make a Professional Acrylic Clear Gesso, which I’ll use to prepare the next quarter. This allows the natural surface of the colour of the support to show through but gives the same priming strength as the white gesso. Here I’m mixing Professional Acrylic Mars Black with the Acrylic White Gesso to create a mid-grey for artists working in a tonal technique. I’m priming a quarter of the canvas with this mid-tone grey, you can in fact choose any colour to tint your gesso. Priming your canvas in this way not only protects your paintings but can create dramatically different results within your work. I’ve left a quarter of the canvas unprimed, now look how the oil paint sinks into an unprimed canvas and bleeds. This will show you why you must always prime a canvas when working in oils. I hope you’ve found this useful.