Art supplies such as paints, oil paints, solvents, thinners etc can harm the environment even the artists may suffer from occupational diseases. So, be careful while choosing a new paint for your home, office, a thinner or a solvent for preparing a mixture. Some art supplies may fume in the atmosphere, within surroundings and may cause some diseases. Some of the art supplies may pollute the atmosphere during their use or when you want to dispose of them after their use.

Why not pick biodegradable, environmentally friendly art supplies that safeguard your body and surroundings around you. Most of these art supplies are affordable and superior in quality. Otherwise you can find replacements for these products, some of these product websites offer raw material at much cheaper cost and methods to manufacture these products. You can design your own home based formula for painting walls, murals and household furniture.

Eco friendly paints and art supplies are extracted from their natural sources. Some of the sources are quite rare still you can enjoy their splendor in your office and home at much lower costs. If you want to use the same old paint, traditional art supplies; you can. But you can avoid using that harmful oil based paints, pastels, chalks, aerosol sprays and replace them with water paints, and natural dyes.    

Some of the art supplies that are quite environmentally friendly are listed as under:

1. Aquabee Tree-Free Hemp Sketch Pad

This environmentally friendly sketchpad is made up of 100% recycled material. No new trees are used. The pad is made up of 25% hemp and 75% recycled. It is low in lignin, acid free and comes with a natural brightness. This product is recommended for use with dry mediums and wet mediums.

2.  Bamboo Easel

This bamboo easel is a perfect compliment to an environmentally friendly studio for work or display. It is made of Vietnamese bamboo. It has a weight limit of 15lbs for canvas and is 62” in height. It comes in one color, which is natural.

3. Earthen & Mineral Pigments

Earthen & Mineral Pigments are environmentally friendly and made up of micronized powders useful in wax or oil mural paintings. These pigments are made up of non toxic chemicals likewise oxides, silicate along with some earthen pigments.

4. Canson Biggie 100% Recycled Rough Newsprint

This product is the ultimate in environmentally friendly paper. One hundred percent of this paper is made from post consumer waste. Perfect for Pencils, pastels, charcoal with a rough surface for texture work and this pad is chlorine-free. It comes in 50 and 125 sheet tape bound pads with a 30lb weight.

5. Ecos – paints and varnishes

ECOs offer a range of organic paints and varnishes which are free from harmful chemicals causing irritation while applying. ECOs paints and varnishes are environmentally friendly and are manufactured using natural plant extracts and from organic sources. ECOs paints don’t need solvent and are available in several varieties, for example ECOs air purifying paint can be applied on walls for absorbing polluted air from room by absorption of pollutants. 

6. Gerstaecker Brush Cleaner

Gerstaecker brush cleaners are environmentally friendly brush cleaners and are biodegradable and doesn’t spoil environment and quite useful in cleaning oil and acrylic brushes. Gerstaecker brush cleaners are also friendly with palette knives.

7. Bamboo Reed Pens

These shafts are perfect for creating the sculptured elegant lines of calligraphy or doing ink work. Highly durable each set of three pens include sizes 8.5, 7 and 6 with dual ends allowing for heavy or fine work.

8.  M GRAHAM Walnut Oil Paint

Traditional oils are some of the best paints to use for art. Walnut oil cracks and yellows less than the traditional linseed oil and is significantly easier to use. Use this oil paint with no additional solvents while offering high pigmentation and no worries this oil is an environmentally alternative to rapid drying alkyd mediums. It resembles the old more traditional oils used through history.

9.  Taskboard

This task board is made from biodegradable, sustainable forestry wood. It is perfect for creating models, is designed to cut easily, glue easily, and makes for the perfect solution for invisible joints.

10. Natural Orange Terpene Solvent

Natural Orange Terpene Solvent is another environmentally friendly solvent. This solvent is environment friendly and suitable for those artists who love oil painting

11. Real Milk Paints

Real milk paints are environmentally friendly paints for painting murals, furniture, wood, bricks, stones etc. Real milk paints are available in many colors but can’t be applied on oily surface or already painted surfaces. Real milk paints are environmentally friendly and non toxic.

12. Yasutomo Liquid Sumi Ink

This permanent black ink is non-toxic and made of vegetable oil soot. This ink is perfect for sumi painting, calligraphy work, makes a great complement for bamboo pens, and this ink comes conveniently in a liquid form.

13. Playbox Wheat Paste

Non-toxic, non-staining and easy mixing sets this paste apart. It is perfect for any paper-based project. Use it for paper Mache, or as part of the art supplies of any classroom for any project needing past. It comes in 1lb and 3lb powder buckets.

14. Yasumoto Nori Paste

This is more a glue than an actual paste; Works well on collages, egg craft, and scrap booking. It can also help you to adhere paper to surfaces like glass, plastic and metal. It is easy to apply, dries slowly to allow repositioning, and will not stain paper. It is perfect for kids art projects because it washes off easily. This is an acid free product.

15. World Win Crafty creation paper

This paper specifically designed for creating greeting cards that are environmentally friendly and can be used in scrap booking. They are 100% recycled paper and are perfect for printing as well. They are 65lb card stock. 

The quality brands and suppliers of paint to artists will generally list the following specifications:

1) The name of the manufacturer and usually the common name for the color: e.g "Scarlet Red"

2)A list of the pigment/s that have been used and the color index name/s or number/s.

4) The amount of paint within the container measured in volume.

5)The address of the manufacturer and their contact details.

6)Also contained is data concerning the device used to keep the pigment cohesive, this is gum arabic when dealing with watercolor or gouache paints and acrylic polymer emulsion for acrylic based paints.

U.S.A based paint manufacturers have the added data of how compliant with ASTM Standards the paint is. Examples of such ratings are ASTM D4236 and D5098, it is up to you to consider how much you need this information and what they denote.

Also be aware of the manufacturers grading system, the higher the letter or number the more expensive the paint.

 The size guide has a basic starting point of 0 and can rise to as high as 30, however as there are many manufacturers and multiple brush styles, no size guide has ever been universally accepted and so investigation is required to ensure that you get exactly the brush you want.

 The smaller artistic brushes are based on multiples of 0 (00,000,etc.) and the more 0’s then the more intricate the brush.

 When choosing the brush that is right for you it is advisable to think off the measuring system as a guide to help you choose rather than a sure-fire system. Choose a supplier that you are happy with and seek out professional advice, as they can tell you how different the brushes will be from one another. The measurement of the handle is also part of the issue. Brushes can have either long or short handles and this will aid or detract from accessibility, you must be aware of your own needs before starting to paint and make sure that you are aware of how heavy the brush is, how delicate the tip is and how it will aid in your performance.

Here is a basic size guide:

Each of the major paint types give different results and have great differences in the end effects. Choosing the best medium to work with can make your art vibrant and alive.

 There are many more types of paint that could be used but amateur artists stick mainly to acrylic, oil and water based paints whilst pastel and the increasingly popular watercolor pencil give a degree of flexibility when it comes to drawing, they give the feel of a painted surface while keeping the fluidity of drawing. Other examples of different mediums are tempera, encaustic and gouache and other more specific paints that are used when painting on silk or other fabrics which use heat to keep them fast.

A brief list of the major paints:

Acrylic: This is a quick drying paint which can be slowed down by adding water-spray to a canvas or other retarding agent, giving you more freedom with time. They can be painted over as they dry waterproof and will not disturb the lower layers, however once they dry they cannot be changed and no amount of water will change this. Can be used thickly like oil based,impasto, or thinly like watercolors. Can be used as a glue for collage or for murals due to its water resistant nature. Difficult to remove from a brush if dried on except when diluted then the colors will appear darker.

Oil: A very slow drying paint allowing for tonal work and shading and allows the artist to cover more canvas area at the same time. Once dried over-painting layers is no problem and the intensity of the colors will remain steadfast with age. Can be used either as a thick or thin glaze, and the beauty of working with one of the great mediums draws many artists to oil. Only dangers with oil based paints are that the area must be well ventilated as there are solvents involved and once a piece is complete it will take several months before a varnish can be applied. Cleanup of brushes requires white-spirit or similar solvents.

Watercolors: Applying water to the brush and the watercolor block or pan they are a great medium as they can be lifted off canvas by simple re-wetting. Due to the transparent nature of watercolors a mistake will be glaringly noticeable and due care and attention should be given to your brushstroke and how to use tone as colors will be lighter when dry than when applied. You must also use the natural white of the canvas for a color as no white is made true enough. If a watercolor paint becomes dried then simple wetting the block will bring it back to life.

Pastels: No time can be wasted when using pastels. You will generally need a greater range of colors than you would with the other mediums as you will mix the colors on the paper and not with a pallette. A wide range of colors and degrees of pastel softness exist but softer pastels can become smudgy and making the color fall away from the support, which can be remedied by spray on fixative agents, overlaid tracing paper or a framed mount, these all aid in pastel work. The greatest help of pastels is that no brushes need cleaning and no studio to clean. They can also be blended with turpentine if oil-based and also scrapped of to reveal the layers underneath, commonly known as sgraffito.

Other considerations are cost and toxicity. In cost, watercolors are the cheapest and are easily replaced. The only supplies needed are basic color sets and simple brushes to use, paper and a board if you need to stretch the paper. Pastels and acrylic are next with price but Oil paints are more costly and some colors can be very expensive. Choose your medium wisely!

The next point is toxicity. Oil based paints require solvents; however there are now low-odor versions and even water-based oil paints. Pastels, especially soft ones can leave a lot of dust and you should be aware of how much dust they shed, don’t blow loose dust off your canvas. Some pigments like Cadmium Red are poisonous but can be bought in non-toxic hues. In all cases make sure that children are nowhere near solvents or paint fumes and keep the area you work in well ventilated.

The choice of your perfect medium can be trial and error and you should experiment, mix the different styles and paint mediums, seek guidance online or from local accredited colleges. See what’s out there and what works for you and you can create great art in no time.

The history of stencils is one that walks hand in hand with the art world and they have been used to create patterns on fabric for centuries and are considered an art-form in themselves in Japan.

In the modern world the amateur crafter has a few choices, they can either have simple basic and easy to use stencils or they can move into the more complex and delicate stencils. The need of the user will determine the right set of stencils to use.

Beginners and amateurs:

 If you are new to stencilling then you should start with the basic and most uncomplicated type of stencil. These stencils are usually cheap and easy to replace and are made of a durable plastic such as acetate, Mylar or vinyl. They are single purpose designs that you can repeat over and over again as you see fit. You can use them with the greatest of ease as there are guidance markers and places for you to secure the stencil to your work-surface, be it a wall or a piece of paper or even a birthday card, so that it won’t move about while you work. There are many kinds of this stencil available and they are made with many different designs allowing you to combine stencils for effect. The only drawback to these types of stencil is that they are not flexible, in other words if you come to a tricky corner you will not be able to carry on, this problem has been solved by some manufacturers as they will provide corner stencils. This is a great way to start stencilling and it is good to get children involved as crafters and there are many stencil designs and workbooks for children to use.

Moderate Users and Crafters:

 The crafter will need more than a simple stencil design as they will want to work with many different styles, themes and mediums. A crafted birthday card could have many different stencils on them, not to mention all the personal touches!

 For those who need to work on multiple levels you should consider multiple overlay stencils. These type of stencils are often used in decoupage work and are a must have if you are thinking of becoming a crafter either as an amateur or professional. The multiple overlay lets you build up your designs from the base upwards. Level after level is built up in much the same way as the pyramid. You start with the base, the largest stencils and the pieces of the design that will be shown the least, in terms of decoupage anyway, and when that has been done either in paint or pencil you remove the stencil and replace it with the next level up, and so on and so on until you have your complete design. The beauty of this type of stencil is that it removes the supports or "bridges" that you find in other cheaper and simpler stencils allowing the finished product to feel more freehand and artistic. They also have more flexibility and less rigidity meaning that the artist can use them with greater ease on difficult and tricky areas.

 This is where the people who have mastered the art of stencilling usually end up and many have successful careers as professional crafters. The types of stencil and accessories that the professional uses are more advanced and they can even make their own stencils, some of them even selling their designs. The oiled paper stencil is used often by people at this level. This type of stencil gives the nostalgic feel of Victoriana and the 1920’s and is a real treat to see. Oil coated stencils are made of heavier paper than the other stencils but the coating of oil makes them extremely flexible. This is what the proficient stenciller will use to create their own stencils if they use carbon-paper or are quite adept at drawing. The professional will also be able to guide many amateurs as they offer help and advice on instructional DVD’s and books which can be purchased online or in the high street.

 There are also many paper stencil design books to be found and this gives the professional the chance to simply cut the design from the book and by tracing the design onto clear stencil film or carbon paper will have a stencil of their own. This is where the crafter will use their skills in fine cutting as they need to be patient as cutting out some of the most complex designs can take hours.

 The stencil may seem like a humble piece of plastic that you use to create a pattern but its use in art is felt everywhere. In Japan the art of stencilling is considered to be of great importance and is known as Katazome. The silk-screen printing process uses stencils which uses a highly woven mesh screen coated with emulsion to reproduce the image. Many shirts and designs you see on clothing have been done with this method. Very complex stencils can have many colored layers. Artistic uses are also graphitic designers who need to create art in a hurry.

Hidden Extras:

 What the crafter should know is that the design gives not only a stencil template to use but in some of the more expensive and delicate designs the pieces that you will remove are in fact a negative of the image you will be doing. This can create shadows and is of great help to those crafters who create decoupage images.

 There are also hundreds of designs from ages past hidden within craft books that have stencil designs for you to copy and use and there are books made just for children with animal, Teddy-bear or cartoon stencils for hours of fun.

 The main point of stencils is to use them as a support. They provide a template but it is up to you to create the art. Use different colors and techniques, mix your mediums like using paints and pencils within the same design, experiment and keep trying and soon you could be a crafting pro!

Canvas keys are small pieces of wood that come with a canvas that allow you to stretch and tauten the canvas, while keeping the canvas at the best tension. They are designed so that the artist can paint without fear of the canvas sagging.

They may arrive in a little bag that is stapled to the back of the canvas and may be made of plastic for cheaper canvases. They may even be already applied to the mitred corners of the stretcher bars of your canvas.

There are ready-made slots primed on the canvas which are waiting for you to tap them in to tighten or align the canvas. If the canvas is unprimed or you are stretching the canvas yourself you should only use the keys once the canvas has been primed, to aid in rigidity.

Some canvases have rigid corners and will not require canvas keys, just ensure that before using your canvas that it is taut. Now you will not have to worry about your canvas becoming loose before you can hang your wonderful art piece.

It then moves on to technique:; how to paint color, pattern and texture; painting space, depth and distance, and how to render a three-dimensional object on paper. The best part is the advice is improved by providing lots of pictures. You will see the step by step way to paint a tree, a face, a still life, a landscape, and many more. The closing section covers the basics of mixing colors, types of paints, brushes, accessories, palette layouts, preparing canvases, paper, pencils, and inks. It even includes how-to on correcting mistakes. The glossary and index complete this magnificent book, making it a much needed resource for any beginning artist.

Always remember that to get the best out of your paintbrush, use a different brush for different paints, oil colors and water based paints should never be on the same brush and could make a mess of work you are doing. Always use separate brushes for solvents and cleaning products.

 Don’t let the paint stand on the brush and be allowed to dry, as this can damage the bristles and the paint may never wipe off. Treat them delicately when cleaning, don’t crush the bristles with your fingers when you are trying to get the paint out, just keep rinsing it, this should remove the excess paint. Some brushes can be softened by a cleaning oil such as natural bristle brushes, and synthetic brushes. They can also be reshaped after washing and by soaking in hot, not boiling, water.

 To ensure you get the best results before washing you should take a clean cloth to your brush and wipe off any excess paint and gently squeeze the bristles towards the tip to coax the paint out, but be aware that too hard and you damage the bristles.

 Rinse the brush in clean oil or turpentine for oil based painting and lukewarm water for water-based, never apply hot water as this can damage the bristles.

 Once this is done wipe once more to ensure that all paint is gone and then wash the brush gently with soap and lukewarm water, dabbing the brush with a miniscule amount of soap and working up a lather, you should repeat this until you can see no more color. With several uses you may find the brush is stained but repeat the cleaning process to ensure that the paint is gone.

Rinse the brush in lukewarm water to get rid of all the soap and shake the brush, after this, using your fingers you should reshape the bristles into the perfect shaping. This can be achieved by placing the tip in tissue/toilet paper.

Leave the brush to dry at room temperature and stand the brush on the handle, never on the bristles, as this is damaging. If you are afraid of toxicity (and we all should be) then use gloves and protective clothing and keep yourself safe.

 Following these guidelines you should have your wonderful brushes for many art sessions in the future.

    Children will like colorful and non-technical work. This doesn’t mean that you can’t be creative but let your kids develop slowly. Crayons and pencils are good for children of any age, felt-tip pens should be for more mature children as small children may leave the tops off and they will dry up. Sketch-books, watercolor pencils or block paints are good for entertaining children, and remember you can’t go wrong with some pencils, an eraser and a sharpener!

    Young adults and teens will want more of a challenge and will be more inclined to use their imagination, a 400 page paper sketchbook and fine tipped pencils will give them the freedom of expression. Let them choose their own medium and they may surprise you, painting is not beyond young teens and they may be more inclined to use this medium. Know your child and the choice should be easy.

    Adults are the hardest to choose for as they have the widest range of mediums to choose from and can differ in their level of expertise. Discover what your friend’s already do and buy things to compliment their supplies or challenge them to use a different medium, give your watercolorist an oil paint kit. A subscription to an art publication or a DVD to help them improve their techniques are also great gifts.

    Some adult beginners may like an Ink sketch kit and these kits are in many reputable art suppliers, comprising of drawing nibs, Indian ink and a lightweight waterproof sketch paper set. Other adults may enjoy a Conte sketch set which helps the more flexible artist to create freehand styles and expressive work. They are made up of a large pad of pastel-colored paper with a putty eraser, 2 large blending stumps or tortillions and a box of Conte color crayons and a tin of fixative spray.

    Whatever you get your artist make sure it will inspire them to create the best work they can. It also might be helpful to think of a budget, before you even start looking at the wide array of art materials to choose from.