Palette Knife Painting

I absolutely love painting with a palette knife! My new love and passion! I love the abstract look of it, the texture, the loose style and the freedom!  I would highly recommend trying it out if you haven’t before.

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Don’t be worried about being perfect because that is not what palette knife painting is all about.  For me, it’s one of the most relaxing and freeing ways to paint. It almost feels like you’re breaking the rules, which I may like a little?

I have used the pallet knife on a variety of different types of paintings! My newest ones are oceanscapes and my proud rooster! I absolutely fell in love with him while I was painting it! So much fun!

I have done several backgrounds with a palette knife! You just can’t create that texture with a brush! Here are a few examples of those paintings!

One of my most loved palette knife paintings to do were my Angels! I have a few of those I have done! That is what makes palette knife painting so much fun! It’s quick and reckless in a way! I love the speed of it. You aren’t doing a lot of blending. You learn to embrace the messy rustic look. I like the imperfectness of it! That is what makes it so unique and interesting to look at! 

When you are painting with a knife, you want to take breaks throughout the process and step back to get a better look at it. It’s hard to get a feel for what a painting looks like when you stay 1ft away from it.

You need to take several breaks while painting and even take pictures of your progress so you can better see what you like and what you don’t.

It will help you see where you need to add more color, strokes or highlights. That is a very important part of the painting process that is not often talked about. Get away from your painting for a better perspective! I make my classes do this when I teach locally and it makes such a big difference!

Learn how to Paint with a Palette Knife!

The secret to using palette knives is loading the paint up on the back of your pallet knife and then scraping across your canvas or board. You can change the angle of your hand as you scrape across depending on the shape you are wanting. Here’s a few pictures showing you how.

Check out my video where you get to see me create this entire palette knife painting!

I like to use a #1 palette knife for most painting projects. It’s super small so you can create smaller shapes much easier. When working with a palette knife you either want to use studio acrylic paint like this one or if you are using craft paints which gives you a wider variety of colors, you can just add gel medium to any of those colors to get thick paint that won’t run off your pallet knife.

Inside my membership we did a three panel palette knife ocean painting that was so much fun! You can check out the time lapse of that here!

Check out the FULL Oceanscape Painting Tutorial

My all time favorite things to paint with a palette knife are FLOWERS! So fun and relaxing! Here are some photos of my artwork with flowers. 

And last but not least, my new Rooster!

Shop Palette Knife Rooster Painting Tutorial

Here is another fun time lapse video for you and some photos so you can see how heavy the texture is.

If you have never painted before and want to learn how, I teach hundreds of women each month in my membership! The paintings you see here today are ALL in that group and you get immediate access when the doors open again SOON! You will have a library of over 50 videos to choose from plus our new monthly content each month!

Learn more about Christie’s Inner Tribe

Want to know where to get your palette knives? Amazon has a crazy deal on some that I have saved in my Amazon Store for you ! This is my favorite set of Palette Knives!

I hope you enjoyed learning more about palette knife painting and look forward to trying it out on your own!