Painting on Crackle Paste

Applications & Techniques: Painting on Crackle Paste with Kevin Tobin, Artist Working Artists Program
This exercise will give you the steps needed to create a modern acrylic painting with an "aged, old-world appearance." In other words, you'll achieve the feel of a centuries-old painting with a process you can complete in a couple of days. I have used modern colors purposefully here in these sample works to highlight the modern/ancient contrast. If you are really interested in recreating a 200-plus year old look, try GOLDEN Historical Acrylic Colors to enhance this effect even further. The techniques described here will work equally well whether you are using OPEN Acrylics, Fluid Acrylics, or Heavy Body, along with Acrylic Glazing Liquid. The thing to remember is to experiment and have fun!

This technique works best on a rigid support. Prepare your substrate by first coating your surface with Gesso. Some artists will wish to immediately coat their work surface with Black Gesso, skipping the regular Gesso layer. I like to lay down a layer of regular Gesso before the Black Gesso for the added protection against SID (Support Induced Discoloration) and for the added "tooth" that the regular Gesso imparts to the substrate. Once the white Gesso has dried, add a layer of Black Gesso in order to highlight the "cracks" you will see in this effect as we progress. After the layer of Black Gesso is completely dry, coat the prepared substrate with a layer of Crackle Paste and allow to dry. The thicker you apply the Crackle Paste, the thicker, deeper and more pronounced the cracks will appear. This is not to say that you should trowel it on inches deep. A thin layer will result in thin, fine cracks which may not show up as dramatically; experiment to get the look you want. In these examples, I applied Crackle Paste to a depth of approximately 1/8 of an inch.
When the Crackle Paste surface is fully cured you will have a dry surface with cracks that look like a dry, "drought ridden" river bed. Now you can sketch out the scene you wish to create. Portraits, landscapes, and still-life subjects all work fine; let your imagination be your guide. (Note: drying times are contingent upon relative humidity and how thickly you apply the Crackle Paste. In my air-conditioned studio, I waited two and a half days before sketching out my various images.) Once you have your sketched image, use thin applications of paint to complete your image; you can extend Fluid Acrylics with water, thin Heavy Body colors with Acrylic Glazing Liquid, or use OPEN Acrylics thinned with OPEN Medium. The object is to paint across the cracks, trying not to fill the cracks with a lot of paint, which would make the cracks "disappear."
Let your painting dry completely. This may take a couple of days. If you rendered your piece with OPEN Acrylics, you may want to wait a couple of weeks. Once you are certain it is dry, then brush on a mixture of GOLDEN Polymer Medium with 1 to 2 drops of Quinacridone Nickel Azo Gold. Drops are small here, as a little goes a long way; imagine drops one-third or less the size of a raisin. We are aiming for a varnish mixture that has a yellow, brownish "cast" to it. While the mixture is still wet on the surface of your work, brush a thin layer of GOLDEN Soft Gel (Gloss) across the entire surface of the piece, followed immediately by brushing on a layer of GOLDEN Matte Medium. Have fun and experiment!

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