Acrylic paint is fast-drying paint containing
pigment suspended in an acrylic polymer emulsion .
Acrylic paints can be diluted with water, but become water-resistant
when dry. Depending on how much the paint is diluted (with water),
the finished acrylic painting can resemble a watercolour or
an oil painting .
Acrylics were first available commercially in the 1940s, although
experimental forms of acrylic resin paints had been developed as early
as the 1920s in the U.S. and earlier in Germany. The first commercially
available acrylic paints were actually oil compatible.
Acrylics are sometimes used in place of watercolors because acrylics
dry closer to the desired color (slightly darker, usually) while watercolors
dry lighter (and often unpredictably, especially for beginning artists).
Acrylics are often used as an alternative to oil
paints because acrylics dry much faster (usually within an hour
or even as little as less than a minute, depending on brand and thickness
of application). Oil paints, which consist of pigment suspended in
an oil (usually linseed ,
or other natural oil) base, can take a very long time to dry: a few
weeks or as long as several months. Acrylic paints can achieve an
oil-paint-like effect, and do so in much less time. Though applied
to look like oil paints, acrylics are somewhat limited due to the
superior colour range of oil paints, and the fact that acrylic paints
dry to a shiny, smooth effect—not surprising since acrylic paints
are, basically, plastic. Accordingly, acrylic paint cannot be removed
with turpentine ,
mineral spirits (also known as white spirits), ammonia ,
or rubbing
alcohol .
Acrylic painters modify the appearance, hardness, flexibility, texture,
and other characteristics of the paint surface using acrylic mediums.
Watercolor and oil painters also use various mediums, but the range
of acrylic mediums is much greater. Acrylics have the ability to bond
to many different surfaces, and mediums can be used to adjust their
binding characteristics. Mediums can change the sheen from gloss to
matte, or can add iridescence or texture to the surface. They can also
be used to build thick layers of paint: gel and molding paste mediums
are sometimes used to create paintings with relief features that are
literally sculptural.
Acrylic paintings, ideally, should be recognized as being as different
from oil paintings as watercolors are — in other words, as a distinct
art medium with its own advantages as well as limitations, rather than
as a stand-in for another meduim. There are techniques which are available
only to acrylic painters, as well as restrictions unique to acrylic
painting. Therefore, judging an acrylic painting as though it were
an oil painting (or a watercolour) is not always appropriate.
Although the permanency of acrylics is sometimes debated by conservators,
they appear more stable than oil paints. Whereas oil paints normally
turn yellow as they age/dry(oxidize), acrylic paints, at least in the
50 years since invention, do not yellow, crack, or change.
