I've been oil painting for over 15 years. I like oil paint because of its incredible versatility, blending capabilities, forgiving technique, stability, and perceived value in the marketplace. But that choice can bring a number of challenges if you are used to water-based paints. So how can you keep from making a big mess when using oil paints?

• Use a quality palette
• Clean your palette often
• Keep your brushes clean
• Use solvents and mediums with care
• Use lots of paper towels
• Wear latex gloves when painting
• Store oil paint properly
• Store wet paintings in a secure place
• Clean your hands properly

Let's go more in-depth so you can prevent your oil painting experience from becoming a big mess.

Use a Quality Palette

Of course, the palette is what will hold your paint and what you mix your paint on during the painting process. Many beginning artists will buy disposable palettes for oil painting. If you are new to oil painting and have no idea if your going the long haul, then by all means buy disposable palettes. But be warned that mixing oil paint on a paper that can slide all over the place is asking for trouble.

If you are going to use a paper palette, it's a good idea to tape it down to a more stable surface while you are painting. However, paper palettes can tear, especially when using a palette knife, and they are usually too small to provide a significant mixing surface. These two factors alone can spell messy oil painting. Add medium into the mix and it gets even more interesting.

Since oil paint dries very slowly, for many artists it becomes a type of storage for oil paint. I don't recommend storing any used oil paint on your palette overnight as it's a good way to waste paint. Even though oil paint dries slowly, it does dry. It's always better to paint with fresh paint. See my article on storing oil paint.

If you are going to give oil painting a serious try, then invest in a good quality palette. There's the classic oval-shaped ones you hold with your non-dominant hand. These are a lot more stable than disposable palettes and the larger ones can provide a nice mixing area. Pochade boxes are smaller-sized painting boxes used mostly by plein air painters (artists who paint outside on location). These nifty little boxes have a built-in palette. Depending on the size of the box, the palette may not be too big, but it beats loose, paper palettes.

I personally like to use a make-shift taboret. A taboret is basically a fancy cabinet with a flat painting surface on top. You can buy them pre-built or even make your own out of an old dresser or desk. I have an old desk that I converted into a taboret by having a piece of glass cut to fit the top of the desk. I attached 2x2 boards to keep the glass from sliding off the desk.

Clean Your Palette Often

I've seen artists create mixture after mixture of color on their palette until they barely have any open area work with. Rather than clean up some of the paint they no longer need, or at least scrape up the color mixtures and condense them into smaller, neater piles, they will continue as is. The result is a messy palette and possibly a messy canvas.

Clean your palette often and keep your color mixtures organized. If you are not finished with a certain color you mixed, scrape it up with a palette knife and set it off to the side of your palette in a more condensed pile. This will prevent unwanted color-blending and the results and can have a dramatic influence on your final painting. Remember, what you are mixing on your palette is what ends up on your canvas. Keep your palette clean and your painting will be clean.

Cleaning your palette periodically has a psychological advantage. Having a palette full of random color mixtures scattered all over can have the effect of scattering your mind. Since good painting is almost completely in your head, you need every metal advantage you can get. I know for myself that cleaning my palette periodically refreshes my mind and is like a mini restart. Not every artist is the same, but I recommend giving it a try.

As I stated in the previous section, I like using a glass palette for oil painting. I can scrape the paint up with a razor glass scrapper, and give it a complete cleaning with denatured alcohol. Over time you may need to replace the piece of glass you use, but getting a piece of glass cut is relatively cheap.

Keep Your Brushes Clean

This may seem obvious, but looking back on my own painting career I'm amazed at how little I cleaned my brushes when I started out. The result was muddy, unintentional colors. At times, I actually did this on purpose. Since I didn't know how to mix good neutrals (and most of what we see in nature is fairly neutral), I would just let the dirty brush do the work of neutralizing my colors. It was a lazy way to get around not knowing color theory and taking the time to mix intentional colors. I was hoping to achieve good results by accident. Sometimes it worked, but most often it didn't.

The other problem was that paint would build up on my brushes and I spent a lot of time wiping off muddy, bad color mixtures from my brushes and canvas. (When I say muddy, I just mean unintentional color that doesn't work for that particular painting. I do not subscribe to the misconception that mixing more than two or three colors always creates mud, or that grayed colors are mud. Both are false from my experience. I agree with Richard Schmid that "muddy color" is usually the result of painting shadows/darks that are warm when they should be cool).

Clean your brushes often when you paint. There is nothing worse than spending 10 minutes mixing the perfect color only to have it ruined when your dip a dirty brush into that pile you worked so hard to achieve. Click here to check out my article for tips on how to clean your brushes during and after your painting.

Also, while you're painting, make sure you have a designated place to set your brushes where they can't roll into the paint on your palette. I've violated this common-sense rule more times than I'd like to admit, only to wonder where all that Cadmium Red on my hand came from.

Use Solvents and Medium Carefully

Keep your brush cleaning solvents in a large, wide jar that won't tip over easily during use. If you use solvents to clean your brushes while painting, try to get one with a lid so you can prevent unwanted evaporation. If you use linseed oil to clean your brushes, no lid is necessary but it may be handy to prevent unwanted spillage. Be sure to wipe off any excess oil from the top of the jar and the lid as oil can build up and dry over time and make it difficult to open or close the lid.

Safe Tip: When using linseed oil to clean your brushes, make sure to dispose the paper towels in a metal trash container with a metal lid, or some other fire-proof waste receptacle. Rags soaked in linseed oil can spontaneously combust. It's never happened to me in over 16 years, but I don't take any chances

Use Lots of Paper Towels

Some artists use rags and old t-shirts for wiping paint off their brushes. I personally don't like this approach because you end up with messy rags and messy hands. Unless you have a tremendous pile of rages laying around your studio, you will probably try to utilize every square inch of that rag, which usually results in a mess.

I use paper towels effusively when I paint. Some people may think this is wasteful, but the goal is to end up with a good painting. And good paintings don't happen with dirty, unwanted color on your brushes and palette. I'd rather throw away a few extra paper towels and end up with a good painting than throw away an expensive canvas and all the messy but expensive paint I put on it. Using paper towels unsparingly also keeps my hands and everything else clean.

I prefer Viva brand paper towels. They have a cloth-like feel and can hold more gunk than other brands (if you know of a better brand please leave a comment below). Whatever brand you like, don't be stingy in using them. I used to hold onto the same paper towel sheet like I was in a contest to see how long I could make it last. And the results were messier paintings and messier hands. This was foolish. The longer I paint, the more paper towels I use.

Wear Latex Gloves When Painting

If, no matter how hard you try, you still tend to get paint on your hands, wearing gloves can help. This won't necessarily keep everything else clean, but it will keep your hands clean. I recommend disposable, latex gloves. This way, when you see paint on your hands, and you want to keep that paint from getting everywhere else, you can whip the gloves off with abandon and quickly replace them without any scruples.

I personally don't use gloves when I'm painting because I don't like the feel of them on my hands. But it can be a good idea if you're concerned about toxins and heavy metals being absorbed into your skin.

Store Your Oil Paint Properly

What does this have to do with preventing a messy oil painting experience? A lot! Let me explain. Paint tubes are made of an aluminum tube that, after being filled with paint, is crimped on the bottom end. This crimping can form a relatively sharp point. More than once, especially when taking my paints out into the field, I've had the sharp point of a paint tube puncture the side of another tube, resulting in a massive mess (and the punctured tube of paint drying out much faster).

You can prevent this by handling and storing your tubes with care. When transporting them, make sure they are arranged so that the crimped bottoms are away from the sides of other tubes. You can also try to bend the sharp edges in, but sometimes this just created another sharp edge. I've wrapped masking tape around the bottom of my paint tubes to dull the sharp points.

Another good idea is to store your paint tubes upside down. Like cream, oil tends to rise to the top, and if the tube of paint is a bit older, the oil can separate from the pigment. The result is when you squeeze out your paint, you get pure linseed oil and no pigment. I go more in-depth about this problem and solution in my article Quick and Easy Way to Store Oil Paint.

Store Wet Paintings in a Secure Place

It goes without saying that while you want to keep your painting somewhere safe until it dries, some oil paint can take a long time to dry. If you are careless in where you store wet paintings, a pant-leg or cat walking too close can spread that beautiful Cobalt Blue all over your house. You also want to be mindful of dust settling on your wet painting, which is more likely to happen if you store it facing upward.

There are numerous racks on the market for holding paintings. If you have some basic carpentry skills you can build your own storage system with thin slots that allow you to store the painting standing upright and slightly tilted back so the wet painting is not in contact with any other surface. Just be sure to put it somewhere where young children or pets cannot access. If you want tips on how to make an oil painting dry faster, click here.

If you paint on small panels, there are a variety of wet-panel carriers out there in the marketplace. Just Google wet panel carrier for painters, and you will see numerous results. These can be good if you like to go out into the field and paint, but they are also great for storing small paintings as they dry in the studio.

Cleaning Your Hands After Oil Painting

One of the best and cheapest ways to clean your hands after oil painting is to use dish soap. Most dish soaps are made to cut through grease which makes them handy for cleaning oil off your hands. You can also use a citrus-based hand cleaner, the kind mechanics like to use. I've found these to be a bit harsher if you're prone to dry skin, but they do get the oil off. There are many other hand cleaners out there, and in the artist market, you will see them come and go. But I've found that dish soap works just fine.

If you're like me and you do a lot of painting in the field where you may not be able to access soap and water, you may want to try baby wipes. These work well overall and are easy to carry (just ask any mom). Another great option is Marvelous Marianne's Savvy Soap. It's an incredible, non-toxic waterless brush and hand cleaner. I love it when I'm out in the field. I can clean my hands and my brushes all with the same stuff.

I hope that helps! Please leave your comments or questions below. Happy Painting!

Jason Tako