Acrylic Grounds

Applications & Techniques:
Acrylic Grounds with Patti Brady, Director
Working Artists Program

There are numerous and varied effects that one can create by painting on prepared acrylic textural grounds. Varying the absorbency, the size of the grit (particulate matter) and slickness or hardness of surface will enhance your work. In addition to using grounds to create texture, you can also add any color of choice for tinted grounds. All grounds were applied to a heavy board. Any surface that has some thickness to it will work - canvas, watercolor paper, illustration board or masonite.

Acrylic Grounds for Pastels
GOLDEN designed this product for pastel artists. It is also a wonderful surface to paint on. It is much like GOLDEN Matte Medium, but manufactured with an abundance of a finer grind of silica. The ground must be thinned with approximately 20% water, and for this example I tinted it with a few drops of GOLDEN Fluid Quinacridone/Nickel Azo Gold. It was brushed out with a very soft flat brush. When dry, I used Fluids thinned with water in a watercolor fashion. Using very wet washes, you can create a velvet quality to the wash. Controlling the amount of water in your brush and using it very dry will allow you to do very tight detail.

Absorbent Ground
This is a very unique ground developed for a watercolorist who desired to paint on canvas. Its properties are similar to painting on watercolor paper. Apply a coat of gesso first. The Absorbent Ground must be thinned, 20% - 30% before applying. Apply up to five thin coats to create maximum absorbency. (Let each layer dry.) In the example provided, I tinted the Absorbent Ground with a few drops of GOLDEN Fluid Hansa Yellow. I worked "wet into wet" with thinned Fluids. For the foreground, I waited for the sky areas to dry and then worked with a dryer brush for more control. Absorbent Ground should be sealed when your painting is finished.

Molding Paste
GOLDEN Molding Paste is a thick gel mixed with a finely ground marble dust. The marble imparts a hardness to the dry surface and quite a bit of weight. When mixed with color, it will create a tint. Molding Paste dries white and is opaque.

In the example GOLDEN Molding Paste has been applied with a palette knife, spread over the surface leaving the texture of the knife. Mixing the Molding Paste with GOLDEN Iridescent Stainless Steel paint produces the lightly speckled gray surface. GOLDEN Fluids were thinned with water and applied in a thin watercolor like fashion to the dry surface. Because the Molding Paste is a fairly slick surface (not porous) the paint sits up on the surface, puddling (note the sky) and creating a look quite different from painting on a more absorbent surface like watercolor paper.

Light Molding Paste
GOLDEN Light Molding Paste is a unique and unusual product that offers an array of interesting possibilities. A "space-age" microscopic air bubble replaces the marble dust in the Molding Paste. This material gives the Light Molding Paste a "fluffy" consistency similar to cake frosting or whipped cream. It is white and fairly opaque in color

In this example the Light Molding Paste is applied with a palette knife, spread as if frosting a cake. Again the ridges left by the palette knife add interest to the texture. When dry, the surface is "wildly absorbent". GOLDEN Fluids thinned with water were applied to a dampened surface. The color spreads quickly and loosely, creating beautiful bleeds. Because of the extreme porosity of this ground, you have a long working time. If your painting gets out of control, blot the color up with a paper towel. When this application dries, you can go back in a drier paintbrush and apply a more detailed stroke.

Micaceous Iron Oxide
Often people overlook GOLDEN Micaceous Iron Oxide, because it is so dark. It is not officially a ground, but works beautifully as one. The Micaceous Iron Oxide is a deep black color, has a very gritty surface and a sparkle or glint to the surface (You cannot see the sparkle in these scanned images). The grit is perfect for pastels or oil pastels. For a ground, layer it on thickly or scrap it down with the edge of the palette knife allowing the color of the board to show through. The example is a very thick layer, about 1/8-inch thick. When this was dry, the image was drawn in with oil pastels. The texture of the palette knife strokes imparts a painterly quality to the pastel strokes. The darkness of the background provides an eerie atmosphere.

Garnet Gel
There are three versions of GOLDEN Garnet Gels - Fine, Coarse and Extra Coarse. Each Garnet Gel is unique, in size of particle and color. The Fine is the one I chose to use for the "variation on the theme" of Monet's Haystacks. Again, the ground of Garnet Gel Fine is applied with a palette knife. For this application the ground was spread out thin enough so that the white surface of the board peeks through. Once dry, GOLDEN Fluid colors were applied in varying thickness of washes. The thinned paint seeps in between the grains of garnet, creating soft washes. Much of the original ground was left showing through. (See the area behind the haystacks.)

Don’t stop here. You can combine all these grounds and continue to paint layers of glazes or gels over them. There are endless variations to work with.


Fine Garnet Gel	Coarse Garnet Gel	Extra Coarse Garnet Gel
© Golden Artist Colors, Inc.