Newberry Art Tutorials

5-Minute Clean Up by Michael Newberry

If you are like most artists, you love to start with a clean oil painting palette. But like most of us, a day or a week of painting goes by and your palette becomes crusty with dried paint. Okay, some of you have decades old palettes that have morphed into abstract sculptures. Nothing can help with that, but for relatively recently dried paint, the following is an awesome way to quickly clean your wood palette.

What you need:

A palette knife, painting medium or stand oil, turpenoid, paper towels, and a copper sponge.

Start by scraping off any excess paint with a palette knife. This palette had about a week’s old dried paint.

Pour on the palette any leftover medium, or stand oil.

Grab the copper sponge and scrub the palette, going in the direction of the wood grain.

Magic presto, 4 minutes later, the palette is scraped clean and ready for the finishing touches.

Take a paper towel and a little turpenoid, and wipe the palette down, cleaning up the residue.

Now finish the job off by pouring a tablespoon or two of leftover medium or stand oil on the palette, take a clean paper towel and rub the oil into the wood. This will protect the wood and prepare it for fresh oil paint.