Brushes
 

Hello everybody! Im very confused here.

Is there a secret to keeping brushes intact? On average- my brushes will start becoming extremely coarse (even fall apart) after the first cleaning. Is this due to poor quality? Or lack of knowledge in cleaning? Perhaps both.

Im not exactly wealthy, so having to buy new brushes on a weekly basis is a bit of a problem. I usually buy very low quality brushes, but have purchased more expensive brands that also fell apart.

My Finest Sable - Winsor & Newton fell apart in the first several days. :!

~ I MUST BE DOING SOMETHING WRONG ~

Matthew

Cleaning?
 

Hi Matthew-

How do you clean your brushes? With solvent? That might have something to do with it wearing out quicker, but it shouldn't wear out at the rate you're saying. What kind of brush? One meant for oils? What kind of canvas? Coarse or fine? Do you scrub your paint into your canvas? As you can see, there's a lot of variables to take into consideration. Plus there is always the chance you got a bad brush. I bought some sables from a company that came highly recommended on this site. The majority were fine, but one came unglued from the brush stem.

Hi Matthew,

Somewhere on this forum is a thread about safe brush cleaning. I believe Marvin Mattleson suggested using baby oil, and baby shampoo to clean brushes. I've been doing this since I started painting and I haven't lost a brush yet. Just swish them around in the baby oil, wipe them on a paper towel, then lather up with baby shampoo. If you want to really be nice to them, use some conditioner (hair) after. Then rinse them out before you paint with them. It also smells much nicer.

Jean

I suppose I am rather rough on my brushes. I tend to, like Julie said, scrub my paint into my canvas; I use less paint this way, but it does wear out the brushes.

I generally use powerful solvents to clean my brushes as well.

Haha! well I dont really care what my brushes smell like. As long as they work for me. But ~ I think they're on strike. ;)

Matthew

Matthew,

One thing you might also consider is your painting technique. I have found that when you "push" the paint across the canvas rather than "pull" it tends to not only wear out the brushes but they also will loose their shape. There are of course, many ,many brands of brushes available. I like the Robert Simmons Signet 42 filberts. They are very reasonably priced and are carried by most art stores if not all. I get alot of mileage out of these.

brush care
 

View www.trekell.com. I've purchased many of these now and they are a great value. The site also has brush care info as many do. I've found that if I don't leave them soaking cause I'm too lazy to clean up right away I'm better off. I use Liquin type mediums at times and this stuff really needs a harsh solvent to get them clean also, so I clean them right away after a session.

As Mike has cautioned against, I also "Push my paint around" in the first few sessions almost as if I was modeling clay, until the likeness appears. But thankfully, I'm finding as I become more confident, I'm employing a wide variety of different brush stokes, with paint on the brush! I get where I'm going much faster these days.

Is Winsor & Newton a nice brand of brush? I would guess it would be- their oils are certainly satisfactory.

M.S.

I clean my brushes out in mineral spirits to get most of the paint out - then wash them in dishwashing soap and water. I rub the soap in with my fingers gently and then rinse til clean. I kind of shape them before the set them down to dry also. I have heard better care, but this works for me when I am short on time.

Matthew..... et al,

As well as being a picture painter.....I'm an ol' sign painter from "way back" and use the care and cleaning method I was taught in the early 70s. I've got lettering brushes made from squirrel hair to hog hair. Some of them I've used for oil paintings as well. I have several brushes that are 30 years old that I just love. Of course, there have been many I have worn out , too, especially the ones used on brick walls.

All I've ever done was thoroughly clean them by swabbing the brush back and forth in a mineral spirits filled can that has another can (slightly smaller diameter) submerged upside down with holes poked through it to rub the brushes on.

After getting all the paint out of the ferrule I dip the brush in motor oil and keep them lying flat until I wash the oil out to begin a new painting.

-Geary

Hi Mathew.

Don

I'd be concerned about cleaning my brushes with any substance that I didn't want to have incorporated in the painting later. It might be nearly impossible to wash strange solvents and oils out of brushes, and who knows what those chemicals will do in an oil painting that we want to last a long time? I just use mineral spirits and nothing else.

Hi Michele.

I am not sure if you refer to me. But if it is so, then there will be no chemicals left over. Just some water, if you are fast.

Highly relevant, by the way.
Allan

Matthew,

I have found that I am extremely hard on my brushes.

The Trekell Hog Bristle's spread out really quick for me.

I wear my sables down to a stub and I can actually hurt a Ruby Satin synthetic too.

My favorites are the Winsor & Newton Monarch Mongoose, here is a link: Monarch Mongoose

These are synthetic too, and tend to be a little softer than the ones mentioned above, but they really hold there shape the best for me.

See you are not alone - I have actually used a pair of hair stylist scissors to trim brushes back to shape.

I know there are tons of suggestions on the care of brushes here. One piece of advise I can give you - if you are mixing the color you need with your brush vs a knife, this can really do them in. Get a good, to a point shape palette knife for this, your brushes will love you.

More brush questions
 

I just finished a fairly large oil painting (on masonite), and toward the end of the painting, I seemed to spend more time fishing errant brush hairs out of the paint than I did painting.

I've read through all/most of the forum brush discussions, but I still have a few questions:

I suppose my brushes wouldn't fall apart if I cleaned them better (I've read the several notes on that), although most of the disintegrating brushes (Utrecht sables) had only been used in this one painting---and they're not completely falling apart--just a hair here and there.

I've read the techniques involving baby oil, shampoo, etc. But here's the question: are you all using a dozen similar size brushes at once for a painting (I read one note that said Marvin Mattleson used 20 in his demos)?

I'm using about four or five different style brushes so consequently, I'm cleaning them a lot (using turpenoid and "the masters" brush soap). Is it the norm to have a lot of similar size brushes with different colors, so that there's only one major clean-up at the end of the day? Or might there be some other critical tip here that I'm missing?

Thanks in advance for the info!

Ken

Hi Ken,
I see what you're saying. Your "mileage may vary" takes on a whole new meaning with using just a few brushes throughout each painting.

Based on what you've shared.....I'm going to go with the belief that lost hairs are due to a daubing technique. If you're pushing and daubing so hard that the hairs are being bent backward to the ferrule....then it makes sense that you're creating a scissors effect with the motion. Especially with such a hard surface as masonite.

The current natural brushes I'm using are Isabey Mongoose and I LOVE them. Do a google search on them to get a close up view and explanation of the material.

Hang in there, we're pullin for ya!
Geary