Explore acrylic spray painting techniques

Acrylic spray paints can inspire confidence and take your work in new directions. Robert Dutton shares his approach and working methods

Spray paints have been around for quite a while now and have become associated with graffiti artists. Love it or hate it, graffiti art is finding its way into the art galleries and on penthouse walls, commanding high prices and is highly regarded as an art form.

I’m using spray paints more and more in my work, combining them with other medium on paper, which is then framed under glass. I find the immediacy of the medium very compelling and the way in which flat colour can be applied on a variety of supports and surfaces, with blends that merge one into the other, really exciting.

Acrylic spray paints dry matt and flat. This means that other media can be very easily worked over spray-painted areas. One of my favourite combinations with acrylic spray paints and other media is soft pastel.

The paints

Acrylic spray paint cans have different nozzles that create different effects. Each brand has their own unique effect but I have found that many nozzles are interchangeable, which is a very useful thing. They are colour coded for the effect you want to achieve – thin, thick, spatter and so on – and are sold in packs as assorted or individual types. The most popular brands are as follows.

Montana acrylic spray paints are amongst my favourite in terms of quality, range of colour and versatility. Montana Gold and Montana Black have 136 colours in their range, with 150ml and 400ml cans are available, giving a great choice to artists. Drying time is rapid so re-application can happen very quickly. Both are a non-scented aerosol paint made to the highest quality, health and environmental standards. With its high-pressure valve, Montana Black allows artists good cover instantly. Spray widths from 1cm to 30cm can be achieved, depending on the user skill and experience, and many different effects are possible with the variety of spray caps available – think of them as brushes.

Molotow ‘One4All’ range is another high-quality acrylic spray paint. It is perfect for those who are trying to minimise their use of solvents because water makes up approximately 85 per cent of the total paint volume. The solvents are only used as a propellant. The paint is opaque, almost odour-free and highly adhesive. Stroke widths of 4mm to 20mm are achievable and the caps are colour coded for each spray width, making spray width an easy choice. One4All colours do not dry as fast as Belton colours, but are more suitable for indoor use.

Belton is Molotow’s premium spray paint range, with 250 perfectly opaque colours that are weatherproof (down to –10°C), UV-resistant and lightfast. Belton spray paints can be used on any surface, can dispense colour quickly

and evenly with minimal dripping, and are very fast-drying. The caps have a low-pressure setting, which is ideal for clear, even lines and detailed work, and a high-pressure setting for covering large areas quickly. Be aware that these acrylic spray paints are designed for outdoor use and should only be used indoors if the space is exceptionally well ventilated. Again, the caps are colour-coded, so you always know which colour you are using.

Molotow’s third range, Urban Fine Art, is suitable for use indoors and out and is completely compatible with other art materials. It comes in 400ml cans in 48 colours, is permanent, highly UV resistant, opaque (except for the transparent colours) and resistant to yellowing. Stroke widths of 4mm to 20mm are possible. The paint can be moved using a brush or palette knife while wet and is perfect for combining with other acrylic-painting techniques.

Nozzle caps include: flat jet – 14cm, super fat – 6cm, silent fat cap 5cm. A super skinny cap, designed for use with Molotow spray cans, has a stroke width is 0.5-2cm, perfect for details and highlights. The skinny cap is 1-2cm, perfect for shading and seamless fading techniques, through to one called super fat, which creates a really wide 10cmblast of pure saturated mat colour – fabulous!

Liquitex Professional Spray Paint deliver high coverage and opacity and provide the same vibrancy, permanence and performance of other Liquitex acrylic media. Being water-based, it can be manipulated with water before completely dry but is permanent and weather proof when completely dry, making it ideal for interior and exterior use. Liquitex Professional Spray Paint can be used on paper, board, canvas, wood and murals on brick and stone. The range includes transparent, iridescent and fluorescent colours, including 50 colours that are matched to the Liquitex Heavy Body and Soft Body acrylic ranges.

Royal Talens acrylic spray paints are available in 400ml cans with 94 colours that are colour co-ordinated with their Standard and Heavy Body tube paints, and acrylic inks. Best of all, Royal Talens have a very useful 150ml can-cleaning spray – when a cap starts to stutter or clog, I place the cap on the cap cleaner and spray for 2–3 seconds until the cap runs clear. As a general rule, after

Drawing is an integral part of everything I do as an artist. Despite the joy of painting, it’s not long before I put my brushes down and reach for media that I can draw with. Here I have chosen Unison Colour soft pastel to add further dynamism to the acrylic spray painted effects. each spray-painting session I spray the remaining paint out of the cap by holding the can upside down and spraying until they run clear. If they are blocked I use the cleaning spray to clear them.

Supports

I buy heavy-duty watercolour paper on the roll so that I have the freedom to work to larger lengths of my own choosing. Board or canvas are other options – cradled boxed canvases are delivered as 40340in whilst MDF boards are cut to size at my local DIY store. I choose Loxley canvas because it is high-quality stretched cotton canvas. Working with quality products inspires creative confidence.

MDF boards are lightly sanded to give them some tooth before priming with several layers of either white of black gesso. This stops the paint sinking into the raw board and brilliance of colour is better achieved.

Working methods

Although spray-painting techniques can be creative on a small scale, it’s in larger works that the medium comes into its own. There are two main painting approaches with the spray paints. One is freestyle, with spontaneous marks, created with commitment, and is not for the faint-hearted. Random, loose ideas unfold as I work, with experience and intuition leading the way. I allow the marks I make to take me on a creative journey that moves in different directions rather than a clear path. I respond intuitively to what happens.

The resulting paintings have more of an abstract feel, and are exciting and creatively absorbing to produce.

The other approach is more planned. As the marks are permanent and dry so fast, decisions about the layering, the surface effects, composition and so on are thought through at every stage before committing. I prepare all the colours – the chosen caps (nozzles) for each effect I want to achieve or think I will be doing, cut templates ready to use and make sure I have other media I want to use to hand. The resulting paintings have a strong dynamic feel, despite the ‘control’, where loose organic drawn and painted marks sit alongside areas of flat tone, shape and overlaying colours.

Using spray paints

In a confined space I have as much ventilation as possible and often wear a mask. Always read and follow the manufacturers’ guidelines for each brand before beginning to spray paint. Prolonged spraying close to the surface creates a dense coverage, whilst quick, short bursts with fluid arm movements in different directions create more open, fluid gestural strokes. Switching nozzles creates different marks and effects.

I protect my work with gloss aerosol varnish when completed as this also enhances the colours.

Templates help to create very sharp, clean edges and I use them a great deal. I cut and prepare shapes as the painting develops and use them to mask or protect areas of the painting I don’t want to spray – revealing the areas I do. The resulting paintings that are visceral, look like collages, engage the viewer and create a unique semiabstract expression of the landscape in shape, form, colour and design.

Without doubt acrylic spray paints are exciting to use, important in my own personal creative process and fundamentally have their rightful place in any creative studio. Their versatility is as open as your mind is to their capabilities – simple as that.

Transient Winter Mists and Sunlight along the Kirkstone Pass – the Lake District, acrylic spray paints with mixed media on 100% cotton 300lb (640gsm) Arches Rough, 22322in (56356cm). Working on a gesso and pumice primed surface, acrylic spray paints were used free style to block in the major areas first and the spray paints manipulated when wet. Masking techniques with templates were used to create the sharp lines of the topographic details with spray paint in layers. Acrylic ink, watercolour and gouache were worked between and over different layers of spray paints to build expressive ambient textural effects

u STAGE ONE Working vertically I began with short bursts of freestyle acrylic spray painting to build the major shapes over loose washes of fluid acrylic inks, allowing the inks to mix and run down the sheet, using nozzles from skinny to wide to vary the paint effects. As the painting developed I masked and sprayed different acrylic colours. Templates were used to create a rich tapestry of marks, colours, textures and shapes. Unison Colour soft pastel was used to combine drawing with painting

q FINISHED PAINTING Summer’s Fading Light – Maiden Moor and Catbells to Keswick, the Lake District, acrylic spray paints with acrylic ink and soft pastel on 350gsm pastel paper, 19¾325½in (50365cm). I added several more acrylic spray layers using templates to shape and maintain sharp edges. I paid particular attention to the foreground to bring together a painting that sits between an expressive semi-abstract and accurate observation

u STAGE TWO I felt that many of the drips of acrylic ink were too dominant so used Unison Colour soft pastel in loose, open gestural strokes to lessen the impact of the ink lines, complement the textures of the layered acrylic spray paints and add coloured drawing in a variety of areas. Multiple techniques of scumbling, layering and blending with different coloured pastels softened some of the edges and created harmony