One of the original decorative techniques in the interior, which allows you to escape from the captivity of everyday life and standard solutions, is the artistic painting of walls and ceilings. She can transform any room: shift the boundaries of the familiar, fill the space with light and air, add romance and bright colors, picturesquely zone and place accents.
Basic principles for choosing art painting
When choosing an image for painting, which you plan to decorate the walls or ceilings of your apartment, you need to start from several important points.
- The plot of wall painting is a powerful factor influencing the psychological mood of all the inhabitants of the house. This dominant touch of the interior will set the bar for feelings and sensations, so the choice of style, color scheme and painting theme should be given special attention.
The basic moment, the sweetest highlight in artistic painting is handmade. Yours or a professional artist is the second question. It is precisely the fact of a painstaking individual approach, a thoughtful look and a willingness to combine rough work with creativity that is valuable.
- The purpose of each room where artistic painting is planned should be the starting point in choosing a drawing, its plot and color. You can, of course, destroy stereotypes further, but, perhaps, it is worth observing the tradition and leaving the kitchen with its still lifes, and the bedroom with nude scenes.
It is permissible to vary the themes of images within the framework of compatibility: for example, a food theme in the kitchen can be diluted with cool abstraction, clouds and stars in the nursery can be replaced with bright cartoon scenes, and the living room and bedroom can be painted in a lyrical style.
- You should pay attention to the ratio of the scale of the wall painting and the size of the apartment. Grandiose historical plots or complex reproductions will look crumpled and defiant at the same time within a small room.
An ornament or discreet abstraction will be a suitable solution for painting in a small area.
The cost of artistic painting is the most pragmatic issue in this creative business. But it is easy to “move” it towards an attractive price if you involve a freelance artist instead of a well-known design agency without requests for painting. Fortunately, talent doesn't often go hand in hand with marketing, so you have every chance of finding a real master of your craft at a reasonable price.
Basic wall and ceiling painting techniques
Successful painting of walls and ceilings is impossible without high-quality paints.
The standard oil and water-based formulations have been replaced by many new types of paint that can simplify the application process and reduce the cost of mural painting.
Acrylic paints
Acrylic is safe, easy to use, easy to mix to form complex shades, undemanding to surfaces and does an excellent job of volume and light transmission. Therefore, it is most convenient to work with acrylic paints.
Important! All inaccuracies and errors in painting with acrylic paints should be corrected immediately. Dried paint is very difficult to clean and impossible to wash off.
Oil paints
Before the advent of new types of compositions, oil paints for a long time held the lead in durability and strength. These paints allow you to smoothly transition from tone to tone and retain bright colors after drying. But such shortcomings of oil paints as difficulty in preparation and application, toxicity, prolonged drying, cracking and yellowing eventually shifted them from their leading positions.
tempera paints
Tempera is most often used in combination with acrylic paints, which allows complex designs to be created. Images made with tempera paint do not darken, do not fade, they are distinguished by a velvety matte surface.
Wax-oil tempera deserves special attention, combining all the advantages of oil and water paints. It contains pigments, the binder for which is a combination of linseed oil, beeswax, resin, water and other components. This is a transparent paint that allows you to create a variety of shades by applying one color to another. Does not change tone when dried, does not dissolve in water, resistant to the external environment.
Aerography
Airbrushing is the easiest way to apply paint using an airbrush that sprays powder or liquid dye with compressed air. Thanks to the adjustable spray intensity, realistic 3D images can be created.
Sequence of work
A clear work plan and a flawless, healthy surface will be the key to the success of any finish, and even more so - artistic painting. At the very beginning, you need to decide on the questions:
- Where will the painting be done?
- what is the task of painting - creating a unique artistic accent, visual expansion of the space, correcting the proportions of the layout, masking interior defects, etc.;
- what will be the plot of the image;
- what paints and painting techniques will be chosen;
- how to prepare a wall or ceiling for painting.
Wall and ceiling preparation
Preparation for painting takes place in several stages.
Wall and ceiling cleaning
The surface selected for painting must be remove wallpaper, paint, whitewash and other types of coatings. Thoroughly clean all irregularities with a spatula, brush or grinder.
Degreasing
Degreasing is necessary for good adhesion of the paint to the surface. Using a sponge or rag, you need to treat the walls and ceiling with any degreasing agent - white spirit, turpentine, vinegar, acetone or special primer.
alignment
All surface defects larger than 5 mm must be leveled with plaster. Minor irregularities are eliminated by applying putty.
Important! Do not use putties on an oil-glue or alabaster basis. They do not allow moisture to be absorbed, which entails peeling the paint layer.
Primer
Primer will serve as the basis for future painting. The best option would be to use an acrylic primer: it dries quickly, strengthens the surface and provides other adhesion.
Create a sketch and sketch
After you have decided on the theme of the image, it is reproduced on a sheet of white drawing paper in color. This helps to check how the selected colors will look and remember the lines.
Next, a sketch of the pattern is applied to the surface:
- A wall or ceiling is marked: the boundaries of the image, the horizon level, the vanishing points of the perspective are outlined.
- Large lines and the most significant objects are drawn.
- Smaller details are applied in detail.
Important! To draw a sketch, use colored pencils from the colors present in the plot. It is generally not recommended to use a slate pencil: black lines are poorly washed off and can show through the finished painting.
To avoid errors when drawing a picture, the method of transferring a scaled image to the surface is used. To do this, the sketch is drawn into squares and transferred to the walls with the help of a level.
A convenient option would be to project a picture from a slide onto the surface.
painting coloring
The most creative and interesting work is to give the image color and volume. The algorithm for coloring a sketch of a mural may look like this:
- On the palette, the main color is brought to the desired consistency. To do this, the necessary colorants are added to the white paint.
Advice. It is better to dilute the paint for painting immediately with some margin, because it can be difficult to get exactly the same shade again. But the paint dries quickly, and you can’t leave it and used brushes in the air for a long time.
- You need to apply paint, moving from dark shades to lighter ones.
- From time to time it is useful to move away from the image, evaluate it from a distance and just give your eyes a rest, refresh your perception.
- It is convenient to paint small details with the help of small brushes or stamps.
Pinning an image
To fix the paints of the finished painting, it is better to use a matte acrylic varnish to avoid glare. After drying, the varnish can be lightly polished with a soft brush.
