How to get “cheap” art supplies

Best art deals and where to get them!

Now, before you get me wrong, I do not mean that you buy inferior quality products. I want to share with you how I get the best deals for quality products that suit my needs as an artist. I do not recommend buying extremely cheap acrylic or watercolor paints, you will find they are too chalky and less pigmented.

So how do I get decent quality paints, brushes, and canvasses, but on a budget?

SALES.

Yup. Most art stores have amazing sales, you really just have to watch out for them. Let me break them down for you.

Michael’s level 3 professional gallery wrapped canvas.

This canvas is usually pricey, even though it is a high quality canvas, thick sturdy stretcher bars and heavy duty archival quality natural cotton. BUT, Michael’s does have a 70% off canvas sale! This is the cheapest deal they offer for all canvas.

This 12 x 12 professional canvas only costs $6.30 ! In order to know when these sales are happening, I have my Michael’s emails turned on so I know when to stock up.

For more expensive products and mediums:

I always save my big coupons for things like modeling paste, gesso, art organizers, watercolor ground, gloss mediums, and epoxy. The current modeling paste I am using is the Hobby Lobby Master’s Touch modeling paste. For this modeling paste, I just waited until Hobby Lobby had a 50% off all Master’s Touch products.