There are many types of paper towels out there to choose from. You can use regular or recycled but when oil painting you will have some specific needs to meet with your paper towel choice.
Viva brand paper towel is the best choice for oil painting. The second, best is the blue shop towels used in mechanic shops.
Wiping your oil brush onto a paper towel can be a demanding task for any paper towel. The brand you choose needs to be thick and strong, absorbent, lint-free, and easy to obtain. The only other paper towel that might take this title would be those blue shop towels that mechanic shops use. Let’s look at why I have chosen Viva to be the winner.
Oil Painters Want A Thick And Strong Paper Towel
For oil painting, your paper towel needs to be thick enough to not rip when you are wiping your brush. It needs to have strength so that it can be rubbed on a palette or canvas and not rip. When you are really in the zone painting away you don’t want to have to worry about your paper towel not performing as it should. Let’s compare Viva to blue shop paper towels. They are both strong, I would even say that the blue shop towels might be stronger. As for thickness, they are about the same as well.
Absorbent Paper Towels Work Best For Oil Painting
Oil painting requires using oil and often times solvents. These two fluids will soak into a normal paper towel immediately saturating it making it too weak to continue to use. Both Viva and blue shop towels are designed to be very absorbent and still hold together allowing you to continue using them. In my experience, Viva is actually a little bit more absorbent than the blue shop towels. Viva has a slightly looser surface texture which allows it to absorb more liquid.
Lint Free Paper Towels For Oil Painting
Finding a dog or cat hair embedded in your oil painting after it dries is no fun. You want to keep lint and hair away from your oil paintings and the tools you are using. The blue shop towels are indeed the better choice for lint-free. They are designed to be that way, they have a slightly smoother surface to prevent hair and lint from sticking to them. They also are strong enough to not pill up when wiping surfaces. Vive is a close second, the surface is slightly rougher allowing hair and dust to stick to it. I have picked up dog hairs on my viva paper towel when wiping my brush.
Safe Use And Disposal Of Oil Painting Paper Towels
It is VERY important to understand the risks involved with using paper towels for oil painting. the process of oil drying is oxidation, this is a chemical reaction that can create heat. If the towels are waded up or in a large pile they can build up enough heat to ignite. Be sure to leave your paper towels flat or hang them so that they can get enough airflow to prevent the temperatures from getting too high. Most painters don’t use enough oil to have a problem with this but it is better to be safe than sorry.
For my painting process, I have developed the practice of leaving my paper towel folded in half once. When that side gets completely covered with paint I fold it in half once and continue. When I finish I just leave the paper towel laying flat on the table to dry. In twenty years of painting, I have never had an issue.
Where To Buy Paper Towels For Oil Painting
Your choice of favorite paper towel should be easy to buy locally. You don’t want to exhaust your supply and find out the hard way that regular paper towels don’t work nearly as well. Vive paper towels are widely available at grocery stores. Blue shop towels are usually available at automotive supply stores, but grocery stores are more abundant and it is likely that you will already be going to a grocery store at least once a week to buy your groceries anyway.
Paper Towel Waste And The Environment
Paper towels are not the most environmentally friendly choice for wiping your oil paint brush. Who knows how many pounds of paper towels professional artists plus hobby artists toss out each year? Why not use recycled paper towels to be gentler on the earth? Recycled paper towels are not a better option because they are so thin they will deteriorate very rapidly when used for oil painting. You would end up using two to three times as many recycled paper towels as you would if using Viva or blue shop towels. If this is a concern for you, you will want to consider using cloth rags that you can wash and reuse.
When I do use paper towels I try to get the maximum usage out of them. I cover every inch with paint before throwing one out and moving on to the next towel. Once one side is covered I fold it in half and continue wiping. Using this technique I go through far fewer paper towels.
Want To Switch To Cloth Rags?
Perhaps you want to be more environmentally friendly with your painting workflow, if so cloth rags can be washed and reused. If you want to learn a quick and easy method for washing your oil painting cloth rags read my post about quick and easy ways to wash your cloth rags.
Bottom Line
Both Viva brand paper towels and automotive blue shock towels are a great choice to use while oil painting. I would be happy using either as they both work very well and are absorbent enough to get the oil, thinner, and paint off my brush when I need it gone.