Painting without paint? Utilizing unconventional art media

Not all artists are content using tried and tested media for expression. Different media pose unique challenges for the risk-taking artist who wants to tread into territory, with each medium offering its own set of application and effects. This of course leaves a lot of room for experimentation, one that the intrepid visual artist, modernist or representational, would be more than happy to take on.

Here are just a few of the odd media used in visual art that have been used to some degree of success.  
Toast

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Finding images in food is nothing new, due to the tendency of humans to recognize patterns. Artist Maurice Bennett takes this a step further, creating or reproducing several masterpieces from patterns using the contrast of light and dark shades in toast. Like-minded artist Hittomii from Japan has also used toast as a medium, drawing anime images into toast using pigments like cocoa and tea powder.  

Glitter

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Usually seen as an accessory, glitter can be used as a painting medium that creates images and patterns when stuck to a canvas appropriately coated with an adhesive at the right places. Speed painter and psychic entertainer Robert Channing has utilized this medium in his speed painting show Imagination Into Art, quickly creating images of popular celebrities and cultural icons in mere minutes.  

Microorganisms

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Using living or deceased microorganisms is much older an artform than most people realize. Craftsmen have been meticulously using the silica shells of diatoms to create stained glass-like patterns and images in microscope slides since the 19th Century. Scientists have manipulated bacterial cultures into growing in particular patterns and have developed engineered bacteria to act like camera film.  

A renowned psychic entertainer and speed painter, Robert Channing has performed live for corporate, collegiate, and media audiences the world over. Learn more about him and his show Imagination Into Art from this website.

Fast food art: The talent of speed painting

Great masterpieces take time to finish. It took Michael Angelo four years to paint the Sistine Chapel ceiling, one of the world’s most renowned artworks. Art painted on smaller canvasses usually take 10 to 50 hours.

But can a masterpiece be painted in minutes? With huge strokes and sometimes with a little help from technology, it is possible.

 

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A handful of artists like Robert Channing have been wowing audiences with speed painting, a technique that combines a flair for dramatic imagery and deftness of hand.

 

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Along with their skillful hands, professional speed painters make use of huge brushes, sand, spray paint, and a splash of light and glitter to produce certain images in a short span of time. The more playful and technically adept ones use photo enhancement applications and time-lapse technology to deliver and present stunning portraits and landscapes in hours, even minutes. Both kinds are nothing short of amazing, drawing big crowds in roadshows and gaining large following over websites like YouTube.

 

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Some have even demonstrated their talent for speed painting on reality shows like "America's Got Talent." Spectators wonder what makes fast art possible. Speed painters believe imagination is key. The more vivid the images are perceived in the mind, the faster an artist moves and the more precise his strokes become.  

One of the best speed and glitter painters around, Robert Channing showcases his talent in schools and corporate shows. Visit his