Materials required:

• A panel on which to paint - pick a size you feel comfortable with, somewhere between 8x10” and 16x20” will be fine. Make sure your panel or paper is correctly prepared for your choice of medium - if using oil paints please ensure that your panel is properly sealed with gesso or similar - note: a lot of ‘oil paper’ on the market is too absorbent to give good result so please test it first and seal if necessary. If using oils or acrylics, please stain your panel a light neutral grey using a wash of oil or acrylic paint and give it time to dry thoroughly before the workshop.

• Paints, the same pigments apply to all media, please note that some manufacturers use different names for the colours – the names on this list are of the actual pigments you need, colour names vary wildly depending on the brand, but good paint manufacturers print the pigment names on the tubes in small writing and on their website – please note elements in bold, they make all the difference!

Cadmium Lemon or any other greenish yellow

Indian Yellow (red shade) or any other orangey yellow

Cadmium Red LIGHT or any other orangey red

Alizarin Crimson OR Quinacridone Rose* or Alizarin Claret or Magenta or another purplish red

Phthalocyanine Blue or Cerulean Blue or Viridian Green

Ultramarine Blue or Cobalt Blue or both

Titanium White and/or Warm white

I recommend Michael Harding Oils, and Golden Acrylics. (A set of these recommended colours in 40ml tubes of Michael Harding Oils can be purchased from me at a discounted price, contact me for details.)

• There are plenty of standing easels in the studio – if you want a desk easel, you will need to bring your own.

• Paint palette: a stay-wet palette for acrylics is essential, a smooth wipe clean one for oils.

• It helps if you can find a way to support the palette, leaving your hands free, I use one of these: http://www.easelbutler.com check it out and you will get the idea, there are lots of ways to do this.

• Drawing board if using paper

• Brushes: Bring a mixture of sizes and shapes, definitely bring the biggest brushes you have, plus a little one for details. I have my own ’Vicki Norman Set’ of long handled brushes for oils and acrylics available through Rosemary’s brushes, https://www.rosemaryandco.com/gift-sets/vicki-norman-brush-collection you can call or email them to order it, here’s what it contains:

Ivory short flat, sizes 1, 4, 7

Ivory filbert, 0,4

Ultimate bristle short flat 2, 4, 8, 12

Eclipse long filbert 2

Series 33 Kolinsky sable pointed round 1

Rosemary also sells sets on her website – these suggestions are just to give you an idea of the kind of brushes you may find useful!

• Small drawing paper sketchbook A5 size is ideal

• Pencil

• Small or collapsible container for water or oil painting medium

• Palette knife if using oils or acrylics

• Kitchen towel roll– you will need lots of this! And a carrier bag for used towel 

Storing and transporting wet oil paintings

A pizza box is a great way to transport a wet painting in your car, place the painting inside, close the lid and pop it in the footwell or in the boot. There are also various types of storage racks and boxes you can carry to your location or put in your car for storing multiple wet paintings. The best by far are from Raymar who now ship to the UK. https://www.raymarart.com/collections/wet-painting-carriers. There are many others available, and they all share the general idea that you need to paint on rigid panels that are the same size in at least one of their dimensions and create a box with dividers down the sides so that you can slot your painting panels into them. Here is an expensive one on Jacksons but you can adapt the idea to make something for yourself that suits your sizes and requirements. https://www.jacksonsart.com/richeson-wet-panel-box-for-8x10in-and-9x12in-panels