How To Clean Artist Paint Brushes
For an artist, the quality of a brush can be just as important as the wielder's skill. A badly cared-for brush can lead to splotchy, rough strokes or unnevenness in painting. Fortunately, proper brush care is not difficult, and can be accomplished in only a few steps.
You will need:
- Disposable fabric, tissue, or paper.
- Water and paint-thinner (for water-based media)
- Oil or turpentine (for oil-based media)
- A mild soap or brush conditioner.
- Remove excess paint from the brush by wrapping it with your fabric or paper, and squeezing from the end of the ferrule (the metal part of the brush) to the tips of the bristles. You will catch the spreading paint this way, and keep it in your disposable fabric.
- Rinse the brush in warm water or paint thinner if you're using traditional water-based media, or oil/turpentine for oil-based media. Repeat the first step now that your paint is loosened, and continue to rinse/press the brush until the marks left on your fabric/paper become faint. You may notice that the brush remains colored: this is because some pigments are still trapped on the bristles themselves.
- Apply a small amount of soap to your brush. Hand soap or weaker dish soaps are fine, though professional conditioners exist to maintain brush health. Scrub the bristles with your fingers to remove any lodged paint by the ferrule. Continue to scrub the brushes until no more pigment appears in the soap's lather. Now that the brush is clean, it is important that you sweep the bristles back into their original shape with your fingers to make sure they don't dry misshapen. For this reason you should also try to dry your brushes with the bristles pointing into the air.
- Remember to clean your brushes immediately after using them. Dried paint can stiffen bristles over time, and acrylic paints are especially resistant to washing once they've dried. Remember, time you spend cleaning your brushes now is less time you'll have to spend shopping for new ones.