— Patti Dyment
Every artist has their favourite materials and methods. Here are some tips I have found useful in choosing and maintaining oil painting brushes.
I recomment hog's hair brushes. They are strong enough to push the paint, yet flexible enough to allow fluid brushwork. They are very bristly on a microscopic level, so they hold a good deal more paint than synthetics, which are relatively smooth hairs. Hog's hair shafts are hollow, so each time you start to paint with them, rinse them in thinner to fill the shafts. This way, paint molecules don't absorb into them.
I use Heinz Jordan series 10B brushes. They are a pretty good quality at a reasonable price. These are brights, which are medium length rectangular flats. The broad side is for delivering lots of paint. The edge is for narrow passages and lines, and the corners are for small shapes and whisks and flips. Unless you paint big (larger than 16"x20") you can manage with a size 4, 6, 8 and a 10. A small, flexible synthetic filbert for drawing on the canvas and a smaller synthetic round for signing, and you are ready to go. Junkie brushes are a waste of time and money. “Painting with bad brushes is like playing the piano with boxing gloves.” (Richard Schmid)
New brushes are coated in sizing and will have to be rinsed with thinner before use. Thinner dries the natural hair fibres, so don't leave brushes soaking in it. I confess that if I plan on painting the next day, I don't clean them thoroughly, I just wipe them and dip them in oil to keep them from drying overnight.
I had heard that you could just clean your brushes with thinner and they would be fine. I tried that and they immediately started splaying and breaking significantly more than before. I clean the brushes with thinner, then Murphy's oil soap and hot water (dish soap will do fine). I had also been instructed that hog brushes should not be washed with water as uneven drying in the shafts would make them curl and splay. And they should be stored flat, since storing them upright would cause the same problem. Both problems are neatly solved by wiping clean brushes dry and coating and shaping them with hair gel. Brushes are restored to, and maintain, their crisp chisel shape until next use. And they smell nice! Some artists recommend hair conditioner for the same purpose.
Happy painting!