But I don’t have the right materials to be an artist…

I am often guilty of thinking I can’t start something because I don’t have exactly the right materials but it doesn’t stop there, as soon as I have purchased something, I start thinking about the next thing that i definitely need. Are you similar?

This year, aside from investing in some eco-friendly acrylic paints, I am going to try to go for an approach of shopping my own materials rather than buying more though this is easier said than done that allure of an art shop always just seems to be there!

So, what materials do you really need to start your art journey?

The answer really is whatever you already have to hand. You don’t need anything special to get started. This could be a pen or pencil and any old paper or packaging material you have lying around. The illustrator Katie Chappell in the Good Ship Illustration art club regularly uses children’s crayons or bingo dabbers! If you are more digitally minded there is always a basic work processor, an amazing Nigerian artist has created these beautiful images just using Microsoft word! https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-59703123.

However, I know that is not necessarily the answer you are looking for if you are just starting out and want to buy new art materials.

So, here is what I suggest to get started

If you want to start painting, I recommend choosing a medium and buying the primary colours of each so red, blue and yellow as well as black and white (if your medium is not watercolour). You can expand this to a cool and warm version of each primary if you want to go a little further. This article from Jackson’s Art gives more information about warm and cool colours, if you are interested in finding out more, https://www.jacksonsart.com/blog/2021/07/09/colour-mixing-the-versatility-of-a-six-colour-primary-palette/ If you can afford it, artist quality will make your painting experience more pleasant, they tend to contain more pigment and fewer other materials used to bulk out the paint. Therefore you may find you are using more student quality paint to achieve the same outcome and therefore the price becomes a false economy.

For pens and pencils – a 2B pencil goes a long way as well as a good eraser (rubber if you’re British) and sharpener. I sometimes use a mechanical pencil but on the whole break them too frequently to make it sustainable. For pens, I love a dip pen, Tombow brush pens (not waterproof) and micron pens which are waterproof – great for painting over.

But what about those sets you can get that contain all the colours?

I do have several sets of pens, pencils, and paints but the main challenge with this is that you are likely to be drawn to some colours more than others and as a result not really use those that do not naturally appeal to you. Therefore, it may be better to just choose individual items instead.

What about substrate?

Substrate is a fancy word for the material you are going to create on (i.e. paper, canvas, wooden panels etc). Once again, the above applies, you can really use any material and sometimes experiments can be interesting. I recently saw some watercolour paintings on canvas which is slightly unusual, but it seemed to work well.

I really would advocate an experimentation to find out what you enjoy using. I personally love cold pressed watercolour paper and use this for all sorts of mediums.