Experimenting with media and techniques

Painting

• Watercolour: transparent washes built up in layers, from light to dark. Wet-on-wet gives soft, spreading effects; wet-on-dry gives sharper edges.
• Acrylic paint dries quickly and can be used thinly or thickly. Oil paint dries slowly, so it can be blended for longer.
• Brushes, palette knives and sponges give different marks.

Printmaking

• Monoprinting makes a single, unique print from an inked surface.
• Relief printing (such as lino printing) cuts away the parts that shouldn't print; ink sits on the raised surface. Reduction lino prints add colours by cutting more away between layers.
• Collagraphs are prints from a collage of textured materials glued to a board.
• Screen printing pushes ink through a mesh screen with a stencil, as Andy Warhol did.

Other media

• Collage and mixed media combine paper, fabric, found objects and paint.
• 3D work: clay, wire, card and papier-mâché can make sculptures and reliefs.
• Digital media: photography and editing software can manipulate and combine images.
• Textiles: stitching, appliqué, batik and dyeing.

Experimenting well

• Try the same idea in several media, and annotate what worked and why (AO2).
• Choose the media that best suits your intentions for the final piece.

Key terms

Watercolour

Transparent paint used in washes.

Wet-on-wet

Painting onto wet paper so colours spread and blend.

Monoprint

A single, unique print.

Lino print

A relief print cut from a block of lino.

Collagraph

A print taken from a collage of textured materials.

Screen printing

Pushing ink through a mesh screen with a stencil.

Mixed media

Combining different materials in one artwork.

Collage

Artwork made by sticking materials onto a surface.