Liquitex sprays are very different from your average can of enamel spray paint. They contain artist’s quality acrylic paint, and the colours are standardised across the Liquitex range. You can use liquitex mediums with them all as well. Because they have very low odour, and contain a high pigment load, you don’t have any of the problem issues associated with enamel spray cans, like toxic odours and fading colours.

The supports Cheralyn chose were Belle Arti gesso panels, which have a very smooth surface, and Arches rough 300 GSM water colour paper. This was great because you got to see the different ways the paint sat on each of the different surfaces. I especially liked how the tiny dots of the spray worked with the textured paper.

Cheralyn Lim works with spray paint in a loose and expansive abstract idiom. I really liked her approach to making work. She encapsulated the concept of ‘flow’ in the way she uses what is around her, not narrowing down but opening out. She showed us how she creates mists of different colours, layering them over the top of each other to create a field with a sense of shimmering depth and ambiguous edges. Instead of using stencils to mask areas, Cheralyn uses crumpled paper and masking tape giving her a much less controlled outcome. This approach meant participants at the demo felt very free to experiment with the medium, and created a lot of interesting effects with the paint. Everyone at the demo was really impressed with the intensity of colour, and the effects they could get by layering colours over one another. People also experimented with spraying really close to the support, so you get a big dripping blob of colour. I think these cans are just going to get more and more popular.

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