A new brand of art supplies has become popular lately and I thought I would try them out. This brand is called Arteza and they carry oils, watercolors, acrylics, markers, pens, colored pencils, canvas , paper, and watercolor pencils. These supplies are very affordable and I wanted to see what kind of quality they were.
I purchased a set of 24 Arteza watercolors, a set of 24 acrylics, and a set of 24 woodless colored pencils. For those who are interested in trying some of these products for yourselves, I have included my Amazon and Arteza Affiliate links down below.
The first set I tested was the Arteza Acrylics. My set had 22 ml tubes of paint. There are sets of 12, 24, and 60 for the 22 ml tubes and individual tubes or a set of 14 for the 120 ml tubes. These are sold as premium paints and their lightfast rating is very good.
These are the colors available in the 24 set. There is a good selection of colors and they can be mixed to get any color that you need.
The tubes come in trays with 6 colors in each one. These are the first two groups.
Here is the second group of trays.
I swatched out the colors on a Silvine all media sketchbook. The colors don't always match the labels so it's a good idea to swatch these. The colors are nice and pigmented. Grumbacher Academy Acrylics and Liquitex are my usual painting brands and the Arteza colors look very similar to those brands. The Arteza Acrylics might be a little bit darker, but not much.
'View From the Lane'
by Ellie Taylor
Available in my Ebay store (Now Sold)
I used the Arteza acrylics to paint a scene in New Mexico of a green pasture by an old fence. I also painted some yuccas by the old fence. These acrylics covered the 5X7 inch canvas just fine and seemed to have the same consistency as the Grumbacher Academy acrylics. The selection of colors in the set of 24 was great for mixing all the shades that I needed for this landscape. I think these acrylics are fine for professional or hobby work and I definitely will add these to my favorite brands.
I bought this 24 set from Amazon for $23.98. The 12 tube set is $12.99 on Amazon and the 60 tube set is $48.98. Those are all 22 ml tubes. Amazon also has the 14 tube set of 120 ml for $38.98 and the individual tubes for $7.99.
I also experimented with the paintbrushes that I used for the acrylic painting. A lot of Youtubers have been using makeup brushes for painting because they are pretty good quality and very economical. I decided to try out some of these brushes, so I purchased a pack of 20 Hosamtel makeup brushes for a total of $4.43 on Amazon.com. The handles are wooden and the synthetic bristles are very soft.
I have got to say that I was very impressed with these brushes. So far they haven't shed any bristles and they make very nice brushstrokes. The bristles paint just as well as ordinary paint brushes and there is a wide selection of brushes in the set of 20. There are rounds, flats, filberts, blending, and even liner brushes. The handles are not very long, but they are about the size of short handled craft paint brushes.
Some other brushes that I tried were small detail brushes used for painting model kits. I bought a pack of 12 Xpassion fine detail paintbrushes. These are available on Amazon for $10.99. I used one of the liner brushes to paint the grass and the yucca leaves in my acrylic painting and it worked very well.
The next set of Arteza products that I tried was the 24 tube watercolor set. Each tube is 12 ml and according to Arteza's rating system has good lightfastness. Arteza offers a set of 12 or 24 watercolor tubes and they also offer a set with 25 or 36 watercolor pans.
Here are the colors in the set of 24 tubes. These colors are similar to the ones in the acrylic set with a few different purples and yellows.
There are two trays of 12 tubes and this set covers a nice range of colors. They also mix well together.
When I swatched these colors I noticed that they are definitely very pigmented and a little color goes a long way. These colors are semi transparent for the most part.
'Seashells'
by Ellie Taylor
I decided to try painting a bunch of seashells on the beach. I used some Strathmore colored pencil paper for my painting surface. At first I tried to get a transparent look, but I used too much paint and was getting a darker color. I then decided that these watercolors had a gouache like feel to them, so I decided to use them like gouache paint. They do work well that way and the Titanium White is thick enough that it shows up quite well.
I like how the painting turned out even if it wasn't like I originally had planned it. I think in order to make these watercolors lightfast the company had to make them a little bit more like gouache than some of the other more expensive watercolor brands. However, you can get a transparent look with them and to see this check out The Art Spirits Youtube channel. There are some great demonstrations with these watercolors on that channel!
The paintbrushes that I used for my watercolor painting were a set of Original Stationary Gold Taklon watercolor brushes. This set contained 10 brushes with an assortment of round, flat, filbert, mop, and fan brushes. These brushes have long plastic handles and soft synthetic bristles. They come in a nice zip up carrying case. I purchased this set for $9.99. These brushes were very nice and seemed to work fine.
The last Arteza products that I tried were the woodless colored pencils. I purchased a set of 24 pencils for $15.57. These pencils are soft and only come in the set of 24. The regular wooden colored pencils come in sets of 48 and 72.
So at first when I swatched these pencils, I was thinking that I had gotten the watercolor pencils. However because they were water resistant, I realized I had ordered the regular woodless colored pencils. I tested these out on the Strathmore colored pencil paper and they seemed to be soft and blendable. There was a nice range of colors in this set.
'Red and Yellow Rose'
by Ellie Taylor
I used Strathmore colored pencil paper to create this picture. The Arteza colored pencils were soft and I was able to get several layers (8 or 9) of color on the rose. I used a little bit of white to burnish the highlights. I am finally learning how to use colored pencils and how to get a decent looking result. This is probably the first picture that I've done in colored pencil where I kind of knew what I was doing! Working from light to dark is hard for me because I am used to working dark to light with opaque mediums such as acrylics. I have to think in a whole new way! These pencils are soft enough that even a colored pencil newbie like me can get a good result. The colors are also bright and vibrant.
Overall, I think these products are very nice and are of good quality. Arteza products are budget friendly enough for hobbies, but are also of good enough quality for professional work. They have tons more products including watercolor pencils, oil paints, gouache paints, markers, pens, canvases, paper, coloring books, and more. Check out their link below.