Your pocket-sized, one stop guide to contemporary acrylics inspiration, practical exercises and exciting ideas for acrylic artists. In this innovative, ideas-led mini guide, master artist and best-selling author Hashim Akib showcases the versatility and vibrancy of acrylic painting. Featuring 64 practical exercises and inspiring insights, on a wide range of subjects, from portraiture to the urban landscape and using a variety of approaches, from colour dabbing, working on a base colour and refining chaos into order, this book is ideal for beginners to intermediate artists. It will inspire you with new ideas, push you creatively, and encourage you to develop your own artistic style.

This developing series is something that must have sounded like a good idea in an editorial meeting and there’s a reason for that – it is good. I said of the first inception, The Watercolour Companion, that there was something about it that you instinctively want to like and that continues here. It is pocket-size, hard covers and, while not sewn bound, at least set in folios so that the pages fall open easily and the reader is immediately receptive to what the contents have to offer.

On the face of it, this is a relatively simple collection of hints and tips that covers the whole gamut of anything you might want to paint in acrylics which is, well, anything. I said of the watercolour volume that the whole point of it is that it’s something to carry with you, so there’s no over-elaboration or extended demonstrations. Looking for inspiration?– you’ll find it. Faced with a complex street scene (this is Hashim Akib, after all) – have a quick sketch of a café setting. Stuck with glazing? You’re ahead of me, aren’t you?

I’ll admit that I’ve expressed doubts before about whether people really carry a library, even a pocket one, with them on field trips, but it doesn’t really matter. If you do, can I have details of your coat or that rather neat bag, please? If not, keep this handy at home and dip into it from time to time. However you choose to use it, you’ll be glad you have it.

Artist Akib (Painting Portraits in Acrylic) dives into the details of acrylic painting, beginning with a discussion of some of the medium’s unique traits: a short drying time, suitability to a variety of surfaces, and the ability to thin the paint with water. Although the opacity of acrylics can present some challenges for artists, Akib shows that the medium’s vivid colors and the ease of painting over mistakes make up for any defaults. Akib explores how a variety of mediums and tools can be used alongside acrylics to alter the paint’s consistency, texture, and drying time and demonstrates how brush pressure affects coverage. Readers are encouraged to try using acrylics to paint the same subject with three different techniques: by filling underlying line art with color, by using negative shapes, and by employing optical color mixing, a method favored by the impressionist painters. Dynamic street scenes, portraits, and landscapes illustrate Akib’s mastery of laying down blocks of bold color to form the foundation of paintings, to which details and highlights are gradually added.

VERDICT: Many of Akib’s techniques require an advanced level of artistic skill, but for experienced painters interested in trying a new medium or improving their work with acrylics, this is a comprehensive resource.

Your pocket-sized, one-stop, catch-all guide to contemporary acrylics – inspiration, practical exercises and ideas for all artists.

• Packed with 64 punchy, practical and innovative exercises
• Explore a huge range of acrylic techniques including impasto, glazing, and more
• Using different applicators: handlesless brushes, knives, spreaders, and more
• A range of complexity, from quick loosening-up exercises through to full artworks
• Troubleshooting tip for correcting mistakes
• Learn professional advice for commercial work
• Discover innovative colour combinations and compositional ideas
• Covers a wide range of subjects, from portraits to the urban landscape.