Playing with rubbing alcohol - a short technique tutorial

Hello lovelies,

As I alluded to in my last post, things have been a little hectic around here in the last couple of weeks, but I have managed to play with paint and rubbing alcohol - aka isopropyl.  (Here in Australia it is sold at chemists under the brand name Isocol Rubbing Alcohol).

I thought I would share, even though this is a far from "finished" page - at this stage I would classify this as a background that is 90% complete.

This is a technique that has been around FOREVER!  I remembered playing with this years ago and I wanted to test and see how some of the newer paints (i.e. paints released in the last 5 years) would work with this technique. 


I gessoed my page and decided on Goldens High Flow paint.  We used to have to thin paint down before using this technique, but with the highflows that's not necessary as they are already thin enough to be used in an airbrush.

Paint layer of the highflow onto your page.  While wet drop the rubbing alcohol onto the page using a pipette.  Don't be afraid to use plenty of the rubbing alcohol. The paint "runs away" from the alcohol so wherever you drop the rubbing alcohol the layer beneath will show through.

The secret to this technique is to make sure that each layer is thoroughly dry before adding another.  Here's the page after 4 or so layers.  Note that you can still see the gesso in some sections at the bottom of the spread?  That's the point of this technique - lots of layers with a bit of every one peeking through somewhere!

Just keep on going until you have a background that you like!  There is a slightly glossy feel to this page as a result of using the goldens paints (they aren't completely matte), which comes up really well, and could be stamped onto with Stazon if you were doing a card.  In this case however, I think that before I complete this spread in my journal I will cover this background with either clear gesso or matte medium so that I can get a bit of tooth on which to add my foreground elements (whatever they may be).

So even if you are flat out with work or just generally struggling to find the time to create because, you know... life...,  you can spend a few minutes every day over a week making a fabulous background in your journal!

'till next time

~Liz