Barbara J Carter

I’ve been painting with some new paintbrushes lately. They’re synthetic, and I am totally in love with them.

Pop quiz: Can you tell which brush has been used with phthalo blue?

These synthetic brushes work amazingly well with acrylic paint. It makes sense: acrylic paint is synthetic, so it’s highly compatible with synthetic brushes.

But that phthalo blue… it stains like crazy! Oh, the paint washes out of the brush just fine. But it leaves behind a very permanent stain. I can easily tell which of my new brushes have touched phthalo.

Phthalo… it’s forever!