🎨 My Current Art Supply Favorites (+ Vienna Art Haul)

Hey there, artist! I know it's been such a long time since I've made a video. There was so much going on and YouTube really took a hit because of it, but I have a new video for you today. And I really wanted to be left me talking in front of the camera because I think it's just more fun to paint and maybe chat as we paint. So I'm going to show you some of my favorite for the month of May. First of all, if you're new here, hi, welcome! My name is Rit. I'm a watercolor and mixed media artist based in Austria and Europe and on my channel I share my artsy adventures. We love color around here. I want to share with you some of my May favorites and I just think it's more exciting and fun to see everything in action instead of just me pointing at products and talking about them. So I've been really exploring painting more with acrylics and I feel that for me I've also been more into color mixing. If you've been here for a while, you know I, you can count on me being fickle and being really into something and swearing by it one month and then completely changing my mind the other, but, you know, with full conviction. So I sometimes or in my art journey I have had many times where I was really into just using paper, paint out of the tube because I didn't want to spend time mixing colors. And sometimes I still do that, but I've just found that the colors that I've been gravitating towards and I'm really, really enjoying and I'll talk a little bit more about this at the end, kind of at the aftermath of all this playtime. They're just, it has to be like the right balance of a little bit muddy, but still very clearly that color. So I just find that I'm really enjoying turquoises that are just a little bit muddy, even pinks. I used to mostly use fluorescent, very bright pinks and didn't like any other kind, but now I'm really enjoying using not fluorescent pinks and also still like muddying them up a little bit. And I'm also really gravitating towards a warm color palette and kind of the star colors in my palette right now are, well, it's Light Rose by Amsterdam. This is like this very light kind of bluish pink. I'm really, really loving it with all of my warm colors. So that one I've been really enjoying, Light Rose from Amsterdam. I'm mostly enjoying opaque colors and I'm just using large containers where I don't have to get too precious with using up things. And yeah, and then my reward, if I finish a container of paint is that I can buy the same size of container or upgrade to even a larger one. So that's how I'm doing it and slowly kind of building a stash of, you know, large containers of paint where I can just use more paint more freely. I've been really loving Yellow Ochre. I always love a warm yellow, so like an orangey yellow, like Indian yellow. That's the one I'm using here from Lucas. I found Yellow Ochre, I don't have strong preferences, so I go between whichever brand I can find. This one is just like the one I'm using here is just a very affordable, like house brand of my local art store. And then all kinds of like peachy colors. There is a color called Venetian Pink that I'm really loving. And also this like light cadmium hue is another, it's like a very orangey red that I'm really enjoying. Again, all these colors that I'm mentioning, I'm mostly enjoying them mixed in with the other colors. So a little bit of Yellow Ochre, a little bit of like cream color, etc. I worked in two of my current favorite sketchbooks, which you saw before. One is the Pith sketchbook. I love them. They're a bit more like fancier. The paper is really lovely and thick and basically handles almost everything with minimal buckling. But they are a little bit more expensive. And then my other go to is the Art Creations. You can see it here on the top of the screen. That is actually the A4 size. They are so affordable. There's a ton of pages inside. They don't like a lot of water or watercolor. So that's, I think, for me, the only downside. Sometimes I feel like they have too many pages that I really get sick of the sketchbook and I want to move on. But, you know, I also don't want to leave pages empty. So you can get a lot done in one sketchbook. And I had this piece of, you know, like cradled wood, which I do enjoy using. And you see it here now. I wasn't happy with what was going on. So I thought, OK, I'll just use up since I have so much paint, I can use it up. And I just, I talk about it in the aftermath, but I just find myself enjoying working on paper, whether it's single sheets or sketchbooks, just feels more fun right now than these kind of frames. But I do like, I think I like scribbling things on top of them. That's very satisfying somehow. So, yeah, at this moment, not super into this one, but it's OK because I feel like these pieces, I really want to kind of build up the layers of color. So I'm OK with, you know, just adding another layer and coming back to it another day. This is by no means finished in my book. The brush that I'm using, I think almost exclusively, is a super cheap brush that I got at my local art store. I just bought one of these packs with a bunch of these. The small size allows me to kind of slow down. I mean, I'm not really slowing down, but because the brush is small, I can't cover so much area as I would with a large brush, which works for me because I feel like I have a heavy hand and I need any kind of strategy to slow down to get also the results that I want. So that's the brush I'm using. My beloved, trusted water container that you can see here on the top right corner. This is from Mijello. It is, I think for some reason, I'm not sure why, but it costs double in the US than it does in Europe. In Europe, in my local shop, I think I bought it for like 8 euros. So it's a bit more expensive in the US, but I love that thing. It's so handy. I kind of just use it as my go-to for everything. And I use watercolors and acrylics on kind of a daily basis. And I just use it for both because mostly I'm using my cheaper brushes. So I don't really care if, you know, I used to be super strict. I mean, I'm still strict with my watercolor brushes. They will never touch acrylic paint unless I decide I don't like them as much and they can be spared. Because I've had lots of brushes basically die or dry up on me because I wasn't cleaning them properly from acrylic paint. So in my mind, any brush that I'm using for acrylic paint is not a brush that I'm super attached to. And I'm willing to take the risk that it will die any day. So since I'm using these like cheap brushes, I use them also for watercolors and I use the same water bucket and I don't have to worry about it. Okay, back to my sketchbook. I really try not to overdo it. And here at this point, I just decide to work on sheets of paper so I can paint as much as I want without having to wait for things to dry. So that's another thing. I've been really struggling with focusing, with painting. And when I find the time and the right state of mind, I don't want anything to stop me. And waiting for things to dry is something that stops me. And so even though in the Joy Art Club this month, we are going to be working mostly on sketchbooks. I can't just use sketchbooks unless I'll be painting on like 10 sketchbooks, which I could do. I prefer not to. So here I'm using some of my favorite, favorite sketching paper. This is number one from Gestekel. This is another local like European shop. I don't know who makes their papers, but they have these huge blocks that you can find in different sizes, but they all cost around 15 euros, something like that. And you get like so, so, so much paper for it. And it's just fantastic for playing. I love it so much. I feel like it has really, alongside using larger containers of paint, I feel like this has helped me become freer and looser with my playtime explorations. And I know this is something I probably need to work on more, where a part of me thinks that painting the way that I'm painting now on screen is really stupid and, you know, goes to the, a three-year-old could do it and is not worthwhile. And I'm trying to resist that urge. I mean, first of all, if I wanted to go by, you know, the authority, there are famous artists, successful artists, you know, that are considered, I don't want to say prestigious, but there are, let's say, well-respected that have painted loose abstracts in similar styles. Not that I'm saying that I'm as good as they are, but it has happened. So, it's not like only artists that paint in a hyper-realistic style are successful. So, there is that. But I think it just goes back to my, I guess, very traditional idea, since I come from a very traditional background where, you know, I went to med school and then I was training in a hospital to be a doctor, all those things. I think skill and expertise is something that I highly regard. It's like way up there in my, let's say, value ladder. And just putting paint on paper in scribble form with just colors that I feel like and I like, that doesn't feel to me like, I don't know, I guess it's too easy, too fun. You know, in theory, like anyone could do it. There's no skill to it, which I think is a false belief because I've been painting abstracts for quite a long time and I think it's hard. So, I don't think it's easy. I don't think anyone can do it. I don't like every abstract work that I see. So, I do think there's a lot to say about style, choices of paints, materials, composition, all those things. But that's, I'm just like sharing some of my thoughts and some of my own kind of daily struggles. I guess I talk about it in a different video, I think, but I feel like there are artists that are just really into what they do and kind of give themselves permission to create whichever kind of art that they like. And I feel like I'm always kind of struggling with, you know, is this good enough or is this worthy? And I don't know that it is, like in some of my, I don't know, limiting beliefs, I guess, I don't know that it is worthy if it's easy. So, just some of my thoughts. Here I was bringing in some pencils and I do feel like this is a necessary element in these abstracts. I love the different line work, like line quality and I love pencil scribbles and I the contrast between brush strokes, thick paint, and then some watery paint and some inks and then pencil scribbles. And I don't know if I filmed this already because I actually continued to paint after the camera died, but I also brought in some oil pastels. Again, a different line quality. I really, really enjoy the mix of all of these and it just makes me so happy and so free. And right now, in this moment in time where I feel like I'm struggling pretty, like I don't remember a time that I struggled so much with focus and concentration. It might be hormonal, like a perimenopause type of thing. We'll see. I am enjoying this kind of painting so much because it feels like that's the bandwidth of what I can handle right now. So, I hope you enjoyed this little chat. If there's any specific colors that you want to know that I didn't mention, then please leave me a comment with a timestamp and I'll do my best to give you the name of the color. The oil pastels here are from Manly, I think the brand is called. I bought a bunch of them for the retreat goers in Vienna. And then I talked about them on YouTube and they sold out. So for now, I can only find them in Art Miranda, which is a Spanish shop. I think it's a Spanish brand. And these are sold out. So maybe they will restock in the future. But right now I don't think it's easy to find them. So sorry about that. Yeah, this was my playtime. The sponsor of today's show, not really, is the Joy Art Club, which is my monthly membership. I'm super, super excited about the coming months because we're doing a three month, so sort of like a summer color journey. I decided to do this for the summer because for a lot of us, summers get very busy. But it's also such a lovely season. I usually actually have less time to paint in the summer because my kids are on vacation and we have all kinds of like friends and family coming for visits. So it's a very, very busy time. But I always want to still keep creating when it's possible. And so we're going to do a focus on color stories, figuring out your own color story in this season of your art journey. June is actually, the content is almost completely done. And I'm really, really excited to share that. So if you're interested in exploring color, figuring out your own color palette and color stories, and doing it in a really intuitive, fun, easy way with a bunch of like-minded creatives, I invite you to join the Joy Art Club. It's only nine euros a month. You can quit anytime if you sign up for the year, which is roughly what half of the members in the Joy Art Club chose to do. You get basically three months off. You get exclusive videos, tons of inspiration, a community of your fellow artists. And June is all about exploring color, but in specific ways, which I'm not going to go into detail. That is for members only. I'm really struggling to keep things contained to a sketchbook, just because I'm really enjoying these quick, my daughter would call it probably kriti krati, like how, you know, kids sketch and stuff, which I absolutely love. That's what I'm really drawn to at the moment. But I also really like it kind of minimalistic. So you see, I really had to kind of stop myself after working. I mean, I could work in like more sketchbooks at once, but yeah, so I really, really like those. And then I decided to just work on paper. I had some, like, I poured out a lot of paint, so I wanted to use it up, which is not necessarily something that you have to do. I'm going to say that once the paint leaves the bottle or the tube, it has fulfilled its purpose. And if you're not in the mood or, you know, you just don't have any more attractive colors, and you don't want to squeeze out fresh paint, you have my permission to let it dry and waste it. It's not wasted. So I really like this. Again, I really like that the paper is showing, this is all like sketch paper that is very inexpensive. This one is thinner, and it's, not this one. This one is thinner, and it's actually my favorite, but you can see it wrinkles, it like, yeah, like buckles a little bit more. It's also more ivory, which I like. And then this one is a little bit thicker, still like relatively thin paper. They're just a joy to play on, and they're very inexpensive, so I don't feel precious about them. This one comes in a block, this one comes in like a spiral, but actually like the edges. As you can see, I'm really enjoying this color story. I don't even feel the need, like maybe I feel the need to bring in like a touch of blue, but mostly it's all about the warm colors and those touches of like turquoises. So here I also added like some paper scribbles. I'm just really, really drawn to this right now, and part of me feels like I almost have to apologize, because it's just like so fun, and so quick, and so easy. But that's really what this makes me so much happier than, I don't know, a perfectly captured, rendered, super complicated, hyper-realistic, whatever, insert here, architecture, fruit, it's just not speaking to me right now. So I was just playing, I was trying a bit that new purple, which I'm, it's a bit too purple for me, but I like to kind of muddy it up a bit with some, a touch of the warmer colors. This one has more going on. This one, I don't know that I like this like composition, and it's a little bit too rainbowy, which I'm all for, but I don't know if this is like working for me. I kind of like the color arrangement here, but I also feel this one is a touch too busy, and maybe not enough like light colors. This one I really kind of, you know, stopped myself. It's speaking to me something about the colors here. Maybe it's just because it has a bit more depth. It really works for me, so I feel like there's something missing here. That's just, this here feel, it's just the colors are too bright. Everything is kind of mid-value. There's nothing really too dark, there's nothing too light, so it feels like it needs more. This one is cute. Again, the colors, I like the color arrangement. I don't know, I feel like I need a bit more muddy color here. This has just more going on, but I kind of like it, and then this one I think was the last one. I was just using kind of more water. I added some inks. There are some paper scribble, pencil scribbles, so I kind of like it. Just like looking at it quickly, I really like the ones that I did in the sketchbook, and then this one I don't really like. Yeah, I guess I like these two, these two the most. They're like super fun. I would love to, even though you can see it's all like wrinkled, I would mount this on like a nice piece of thick paper, or I would frame it with like a thick white mat, like photo mat, and a nice big white frame, and I think it would look so, so pretty. It's just like a color story I'm really vibing with right now, and there's just a lot here that I'm liking. So what I didn't really like was working on this. I think I'm just not really feeling this surface right now, so I'm really just trying to kind of tap into what makes me happy. I like the colors. I feel like I like it more now than before, but it wasn't like such a joyful experience as these. I do want to share that in the beginning of May we had our first Vienna artist gathering retreat type of thing, and it was, I mean, seriously better than I could have imagined. The weather was perfect, which if you live in Europe, you know, I mean, just that is already like winning the lottery, and Vienna did not disappoint. We had the best time. We explored the city, we went to museums, we ate great Austrian food, tasted all the cakes, all the ice cream, and other goodies, and we had an international group, and it was just amazing. Me being me, I really wanted to enjoy the moment since it was such a big event for me, the first retreat that I led and created, and I really think it is unique. We spent the time kind of absorbing inspiration and enjoying the city, as opposed to, I think, a traditional artist retreat where you spend also exploring the place, hopefully, but you spend a painting, which is amazing, but it's just that doesn't always work for people, and I really wanted to do something different, and it was so, so incredible. We had some private tours at my favorite museums in Vienna, so just for us, just for the group, and it was so fun, and so inspiring, and just like really, really enjoyable to spend time with like-minded people that kind of enjoy the same things, which was a mixture of strolling the streets, exploring the food, seeing the art, enjoying the architecture, going to museums. I'm considering doing, I think spring is like the perfect time for this type of event, so it might be like an annual thing, but I'm also considering doing one in November, so kind of mid-end of November, which means that all the Christmas markets in Vienna will be operating, and of course, the museums are open, but it's before, it's still busy, because I've been to Vienna in November, it's still busy, but if I do this, I'm going to do this during the week, so not on weekends, and actually, the markets open already in the morning, so you can go and enjoy, you know, the food and the atmosphere earlier, before all the masses, and it actually gets dark really early, so you can enjoy like all the lights and stuff, also at five in the afternoon, so I'm considering doing that. If you're interested, I will put a link below, so you can join like a interest list, email list, so if I see a lot of people are interested, then I will definitely consider it. You know, November, the problem is that it does get really cold, Vienna is always windy, so I know not everyone feels comfortable with extreme weather conditions, it doesn't get like insanely cold, but all of that is relative, but you know, you need to kind of bundle up and have good quality winter clothes, so that's kind of like my only thing I'm not so sure about November, but it does mean you get to experience the Christmas markets, which Vienna won in 2025, I think Vienna won as like the prettiest markets in Europe, I haven't really been to Christmas markets outside of Austria, but from what I've seen, there are a few places that I really want to visit, like Strasbourg in that area in France, but Vienna is glorious, it has tons of different markets with different vibes, and I think November could be like a really fun time to explore that combo, you know, you can still enjoy the museums, the architecture, the food, the atmosphere, but then you get it on steroids because of all the Christmas markets, and it's truly a magical, magical time in Vienna, so considering doing this, let me know in the comments if this sounds interesting to you, it would probably be sort of like a Monday to Friday type of thing at the end of November, because that works best, I think, kind of price-wise to still not make it like crazy expensive, everything gets more and more expensive the closer you get to Christmas, and also there are more and more people, which I personally like, I can't stand it, for me it always reduces the enjoyment when there are a ton of people, I know that during the week it is quite comfortable to experience the market, yeah, so definitely it's going to be during the week and not a weekend, if that helps you decide one way or the other, I think it's just really nice to, I'm usually in my family, let me know how it is in yours, I'm usually the planner organizer, and usually I don't have a lot of partners for that in my family, so I'm mostly the only one that kind of knows what's going on, and so I think that it's really fun to come to a new place and have someone else take care of everything, that someone else would still be me, but I'm thinking of like, if I were you, you know, a potential attendee, is that a word, a potential participant, it's just really fun, because we were also able, because we weren't a large group, it was seven people including me, I was able, and because I feel like I know the city so well, I was really able to kind of tailor the activities in real time to what people felt like, so it was really flexible and people could kind of like opt in and opt out very comfortably and conveniently, because Vienna is like so compact and walkable, we were never too far from our hotel, so if people got, I don't know, tired or just wanted, you know, some alone time or relaxing time, it was very easy to just go do that for like a couple of hours and then join us later in the day, which is not always possible, you know, if you're going on a bus somewhere, it's not always possible, but the way that Vienna is and the way that I planned it, so I give full credit to Vienna, I think that was another great feature of the retreat, which really made it very kind of customizable and really comfortable, so if you wanted to be kind of with the group the whole time, we had activities from morning till evening, but if you wanted to do your own thing, which some people opted to do in, you know, certain times of the day, that was very, very easy to do, easeable is not a word, so yeah, it was so amazing, and even though we went to my favorite museums, which I have visited countless times, because of the private tours, we really got a chance, like I learned a lot, a lot of things I didn't know, and we really got a chance to like, you know, ask our questions and focus on pieces that we were interested in, you know, art movements that we were interested in, and I thought it was amazing. We did a guided tour in the Albertina, which is my favorite museum in Vienna, and the guide was fantastic, like so knowledgeable, made the experience really rich and kind of well-rounded, and then we did another guided tour in the Belvedere, which is just a gorgeous palace with some amazing artwork, especially from Klimt, including the Kiss, which is I think one of his most famous pieces, that is just like breathtaking, and what was really great having the guide there is that I feel like she really showed us the development in Klimt's work, and again, I've been there multiple times, but usually I just like walk around and enjoy the pretty paintings, that's just me. I don't really have like the brain capacity or wish, like I just, I don't remember like details and dates and that sort of thing, and I felt like she really knew how to take us through like a great chronological order of the pieces shown there to show how his work developed and, you know, who he was influenced by and who was influenced by him, Klimt I'm talking about, so I found that really interesting, and yeah, we had such a great time. I got amazing feedback, so I know I'm not just like talking from my point of view. Of course, we went to the huge art store and people shopped till they dropped. The art store was great. I showed people some of my specialty shops, and I did pick up a few things. I have to show you what I got. This is so pretty, I'm still not sure what I'm going to do with it, but you have to see this thing. There's like an area with really cute shops. I was eyeing this already when I did my scouting trip back in March, but I only saw it in the window because it was Sunday and everything is closed on Vienna on Sunday, almost everything. So I went back and I picked it up, and how pretty is this? I mean, I don't even know how they made it. It kind of looks like those Kadi, you know, handmade, I think in India, sketchbooks. They only had three, this one, and then an orange one, and then a blue one. I mean, I just, I mean, this had my name all over it. So I came back after, it was a risk because, you know, it was like two months apart, the scouting trip and the retreat, but I know that the universe takes care of me when I wish for things, so I wanted it. It was exactly in the price that I guesstimated, and I also said, okay, that's what I want to spend, which I assumed, which I assumed wasn't going to be like super cheap, because the paper seems really, yeah, it really seems like that handmade paper you see from Kadi. So I guesstimated, like I said, it should probably be around 40 euros, and that was the price. So I got it. It has like slight color variations, I don't know if you can tell. Very slight. I think the orange one had like a more color variations, but I just thought it was like so pretty, and so unique. I haven't seen anything like it. It's like watercolor paper that seemed really handmade. I don't know how much watercolor is going to show on this, so I'm guessing anything opaque would work better. I'm thinking some gouache and maybe some colored pencils or wax pastels. I think those are going to be the winners here, but yeah, so excited about that. Just something really special, and it's also a souvenir from the first retreat in Vienna. I was very calm in the art store, and I picked up, I wanted to try, I love the golden high flow acrylics, and I wanted to try the sepia. So I'm kind of like trying to find a dark neutral that I really like. I don't know if this is it, we'll see. And then I wanted to replenish my beloved deep violet from Liquitex, but I made a mistake, and I bought by accident purple, which I don't think this is at all the color that I wanted. Maybe I'll try to mix something into the bottle to get the color that I like. I don't know if I can do that, but I really love the deep, deep violet. Such a great color. It's such a great dark, but still kind of alive and gorgeous color, and I'm almost out of it. So I wanted to buy a new one, and I wasn't, I think I was just too distracted, and I really wanted to help the other people that were more overwhelmed from the huge art store. So I didn't pay attention, that I picked up the wrong color. Very sad. And of course I had to get a new luminance pencil, dark indigo. This is my favorite dark pencil at the moment. It dethroned the drawing black, I don't remember the name, something black, carbon black or something, true black something, which I went through several until I discovered this one. This dark indigo, it's, it reads black, but it's a very, very dark indigo. And I'm, I think I'm down to like this much in my first one, so I got a new one. Very exciting. I resisted all of the other colors that jumped on me. Should deserve, should get like a medal or something, is what I'm thinking. The people of the retreat also got an amazing goodie bag. They were all so, so happy, and it was really exciting and fun to see how they enjoyed it. There was like some of my favorite watercolors. We had some Aquarius watercolors, Holbein watercolors, and a bunch of other great brands. Some great pencils from Derwent, and I think also Luminance, like a couple of my favorite colors. There were also some Neo colors there, and gorgeous colors. So, of course, a sketchbook and lots of different papers that I have gathered in my travels around the world. And so everyone got like a nice sample of yummy, delicious papers from Italy, France, Japan, all kinds of fun things. And it was just incredible. Thank you so much for watching. I hope you enjoyed this video. Please consider to subscribe if you haven't already, and give this video a thumbs up. It really, really helps. Or you can hype it on mobile. It just helps YouTube know that you enjoy my videos. I'll see you in the next video very soon. Take care, bye-bye.