Fumes

Now that my classes have ended, I've started painting at home more. I'm still experimenting with the setup to find something that is quick to set up and doesn't fume up the flat.

I've also been making my way through a bunch of books on the matter, the most recent one of which was The New Oil Painting by Kimberly Brooks. It's a small book and a good introduction for beginners to everything related to oil painting.

Brooks talks about how she doesn't use any solvents and how she believes they hurt the environment and the painter's health. She also claims they are an unnecessary invention of the 19th century.

I started wearing gloves while painting in oils a while ago after I noticed that my skin coming in contact with odourless solvent made it dry and peel in the days after. Sharon, one of my teachers at the Royal Drawing School, swears by a product called Co Co Bello which claims to be non-hazardous. It's what I've been using lately and at least the smell doesn't give me headaches but how accurate their claims regarding its non-toxicity are I have no way of verifying. There are also Sennelier's Green For Oil range and Zest-it that come with similar claims which perhaps I'll try at some point.

I've so far only used solvents for underpaintings and to clean my brushes. At the London Fine Art Studios, we were discouraged from using it at all during the painting process.

As a first step of possibly getting rid of anything too toxic, I'm going to try what she suggests in the book: cleaning with more oil. My brushes are all pretty cheap so I'm happy experimenting a little in the service of our health. I've ordered a paint tray on Amazon to try to set something up with Vegetable oil from Tesco so I can soak my brushes overnight after using them.