Varnishing A Painting

One of the last things that you wanna do before you send your hard earned sweat and tears into the world is varnish your painting. Hi, I'm Katie Lydiard. Join me as I varnish my painting here. So one of the first things that you want to remember before you varnish a painting is you wanna make sure that your painting is completely dry. Manufacturers of the varnish typically recommend waiting about six months, six months to a year before you want to varnish a painting. This one has been drying for several years. So we're totally in the clear there. The other thing that you want to know is that you don't need a lot of varnish to be able to protect this painting uh to its full extent, it doesn't need a big heavy layer for the painting to be able to be protected. Um And also you will also want the painting still to be able to breathe. Oil paint oxidizes as it dries, it doesn't actually dry, it oxidizes, so it still needs some breathing room. Um And the varnish allows for that to still breathe and oxidize while it's protecting the painting. So I have a little bit of varnish here in this container and I am just using an old scrubby brush. This is now become my varnish brush because, you know, it's just worn down to utter bits. You don't want anything too rough, you want something a bit, you know, softer. This is a synthetic brush, um, but it doesn't have to be anything fancy. So, like I said, you don't need a whole lot of varnish. I'm just gonna get a little bit on here and come over here and I'm just gonna start scrubbing this in and you'll be able to see the colors are gonna start to become very vibrant. That is the varnish just reinvigorating those colors and that's how they'll stay now that they have this varnish on top of them. Like I said, you want to make sure that this painting is dry because as you're scrubbing this on, if the painting isn't dry and not only will it come up into the varnish, the pigment, um It's, it's not going to dry as effectively with the varnish on top of it. So we want to not only make sure that we're protecting it, but we're keeping or preserving what's underneath properly. Now, the varnish that I'm using is called Gam VR by Gamblin. Um It is a really easy varnish to work with and it dries to a bit of a semi gloss finish. You can get some high gloss varnishes. Um My problem with the high gloss ones is that then you have a lot of glare that you have to deal with while, you know, the viewer is trying to see it. If they have to kind of keep repositioning the way that they're looking, um, then that can get kind of annoying. And then there are also matte varnishes if that is something that you would prefer a more matte look to your painting, so it's completely personal preference. But do while you're doing this kind of change your view to make sure that you get every last inch covered in varnish. You don't want to miss any spots a little bit more. And I'm really not pulling up much while I dip in there. It's so little the amount that I need, I just need it to cover. That's all I'm going for and I'm working it into the texture of the painting as well. Getting every last inch. There we go. Ok. So I'm going to let this dry for about 10 to 20 minutes and then it will be ready to go pack up. So when you are done with your painting, be sure to get that extra layer of protection before you send it off to the gallery. Thanks so much for joining me.