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Speaking of budgets...I teach high school art for advanced classes. We use
tempera, acrylic, watercolor, and oil paints....and I have $1000 to spend.
I have no brushes left over from this year...and no printing supplies at
all...a few tubes of watercolor, some acrylic....and no oil paints, but have
canvas.
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!! I don't know how I'm going to make it next
year!
Carolyn Roberts
<snip>

Carolyn...
First of all, I would order the gallon sized Chromacryl (acrylics) from Sax,
or Nasco, with the pumps. You can really control how much is squeezed out.
Since your budget is low, I'd choose acrylics, drop oils, and pick tempera
paint to substitute watercolors. Tempera is much cheaper than watercolors.
I buy Crayola powdered Tempera paint...mix it up, and fill a half-dozen
plastic Rubbermaid ketchup style bottles. I buy freezer wrap paper which
kids can use as palettes to throw away, and they tape the corners down to
their tables, shiny side up. A drop of color the size of a dime/nickel will
last the whole period, and mixes with water and applies like watercolors
nicely. Those pans of color to replace in watercolor trays are expensive.
You can buy a jar of powdered tempera for what a whole half pan would cost,
and used as a watercolor, will last the whole year.

Then...I'd switch gears and paint the "Cape Cod" school style for which
Charles Hawthorne was known. He knew that students have so much to learn
about color, shape...seeing, that his students used the palette knife only.
I myself am known in my state for my wildlife paintings that have 200-300
painstaking hours of time in them, which I do for competition, however, I am
getting perhaps more known now for my painterly landscapes that I do on
location. If I can learn to do this myself, young people not having the
habit I had for detail can!

Buy the white plastic diamond shaped palette knifes that are about 1-3/4" in
length. One palette knife becomes many brushes, simply because with a
simple swipe in a paper towel, the knife is cleaned, and it can pick up
another color. These palette knifes are about a dollar a piece, or less.
Again, you can use freezer wrap paper shiny side up, or styrofoam flat
picnic plates..(when dry use other side). Students begin by wrapping a
piece of a rag around their index finger, and wiping dark masses of color
onto their canvas/boards. Teaching them to squint their eyes at the subject
to eliminate details. From their, they go at it with the palette knife. By
using the knife's edge, they get fine lines, the tip they get dabs...the
whole blade larger swaths of color. Show them Impressionist images to
inspire them...or even modern painterly artists.

Buy some local tempered masonite (press board/hard board) 1/8 to 1/4 inch
which comes in 4'x 8' sheets for about $15-$17, and cut up, which is cheaper
than buying canvas boards or canvas and stretcher frames. Simply gesso
those up, and paint.

Now..one last thing, you can if necessary...use acrylics to print with as
well. You could buy a bottle of extender medium to mix with color to slow
the drying time down.
Well...these are just some suggestions....
good luck!

Larry Seiler
Landscape Paintings-
http://www.artistnation.com/members/lofts/lseiler/
Professional Plein Air Painters-
http://nhstudios.com/NAPAPAFrameSet.html

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