More Fun with Gesso!

Welcome back to another BobBlast.

Gesso, as you know, is a paint primer. It’s the first paint coat applied to stretched canvases. Its purpose is for better adhesion for subsequent layers of acrylic of oil paint.

You may recall I also brush or squeegee gesso on my 300 lb watercolor paper - for the same reason. I prefer painting on the dried, hard gesso, instead of the natural soft paper.

And… there is also the added fun benefit of introducing texture at this point. The gesso I like to use is thick - so instead of a smooth finish, adding texture by scraping lines or stamping patterns in the applied gesso is ideal at this time - while it is still wet.

My added textures of choice, besides scraping lines and imprinting bubble wrap for a heated pattern, is layering tissue papers into wet gesso. Another product I like using for texture is Heavy Texture Gel Medium. I trowel it on for a similar effect. You can watch me demonstrate these techniques in the video.

Also available for creating texture are high-peaking thicker gels and gesso for building and sculpting. All art catalogs and better art stores have a variety to choose from.

When all the above dries, I begin painting.

The finished surface will appear to look like thick paint, when actually very little paint was used.

There are books and classes on texturing - but for me, this is what I’ve narrowed it down to!

Play with the surface before painting!

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