Have you ever had so much of something or seen so much of something and then feel like you've seen enough?  That is what happened to me after being at NAMTA Art Materials Expo for 3 days. At this expo they pretty much have every art supply ever made for you to view at this expo, making it the biggest art store I have ever seen. The weirdest thing to me was that there was nothing for sale that I could buy, boy... talk about being in a candy store and not being about to get any candy. Of course, I will be able to buy all those supplies, but it will have to be from an art store once I get home.

 

Most of the art supplies and suppliers I have seen before or heard of and then there are some that are new but have the same kind of art supplies as the others but just with another name. I think I saw every watercolor manufacturer and even a couple I haven't heard of. Like I said before after seeing so many of something, like watercolors, they all start looking alike. I know each brand is probably a little different but it starts all blending together when you see too many.

 

I was helping the Legend paper company with promoting their brand new watercolor paper which is black. Right now you are probably thinking, what and why a black watercolor paper. I have to say I thought the same thing when they first came to me and asked me about it. This paper is the same as Legends Stonehenge Aqua White watercolor paper, but this one is black. I pretty much liked it but will love it more when they come out with a 300lb version. It took some getting used to working in reverse with this black paper, but after I tried it a few times I think I got the hang of it. See some of those tries and paintings here that I painted on the black paper.

 

At first, I wanted to review a bunch of the supplies in this newsletter of what I saw at the expo but there were just way too many products and it would take a large book to go over them all. Let's just say most everything I saw was totally awesome and if I had the money I would buy it all.

 

The only other supplies I wanted to mention is the Holbein Acryla Gouache and the Fluid Acrylic. These paints used together just work wonders. I like using the fluids like watercolor and the Acryla acts like a acrylic just not quite as thick as a heavy bodied acrylic. I also like the metallic colors of the Acryla Gouache.

 

A lot of these Holbein products I will be using in many of my new acrylic classes in the future, stay tuned.