How to Do the Dutch Pour Painting Technique For Beginners

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Click play above to watch my YouTube video of this project.

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If you have time, please also check out my Etsy store where I sell my work along with many other handmade pieces.

Tools and materials:

• A canvas (16” x 20”)
• Acrylic paints, accent, and background colors
• Floetrol
• Silicone spray
• Water
• Mixing cups
• Mixing sticks
• Hair dryer and flat nozzle
• Gloves

1. Mixing the paints

I originally got my recipe online but since then I’ve tweaked it until I found the perfect mix for me.

Recipe: 1 part paint, a splash of water and 1 part floetrol. Mixed together in that order followed by a quick spray of silicone.

Process: Add a splash of water to your paint and mix well until you achieve a warm honey-like texture. If your paint is too gloopy, add a touch more water. Once the warm honey texture is achieved, add the floetrol. Mix fully until the consistency is still that of warm honey. Do this with all your colours, accent and background.

Then set your background colours aside. Add a quick spray of silicone to your accent colours only and mix in gently.

My accent colours are orange, turquoise, red and navy and my background colours are black and white.

Now you’re good to go!

2. Preparing the canvas

You can choose to have your background however you want, I decided to divide my canvas in half diagonally and cover 1 half in white and the other half in black.

Use a generous amount of paint to cover the canvas but keep some back for a later step. If you don’t use enough paint at this stage, your pour won’t ‘blow out’ as well later on.

3. Adding accent colors

One by one, pour a line of each accent color across your canvas along the divide between the black and white, one on top of the other.

Again, be liberal with your paint. This is the last time you should need your accent colours so don’t worry about using them up.

Remember, you can watch how I do this in my YouTube video above.

4. Create barriers

Grab your leftover black and white paint from earlier and create thick ‘barriers’ on both sides of your accent color dividing line.

Do this by pouring the rest of your background paints along the edge of the divide but still on their corresponding color side.

5. Cover up

Using your hair dryer and holding it low and flat, blow the black and white ‘barriers’ towards each other so that they meet in the middle of your canvas.

The aim is to blow the black and white over the accent colour line creating a mix in the middle that is ready to be blown outwards, Dutch-pour-style.

6. Blow out

Don’t worry if the black and white paint hasn’t completely covered your accent colors, this is tricky to do and there is usually always some color left poking out, this isn’t a problem.

Once you’ve prepped your mix and it’s sitting in the middle of your canvas, use your hair dryer in a zig-zag motion to blow all the paint out from the middle across the blank parts of your canvas.

7. Soften the edges

Using a straw, blow out any harsh edges to add soft feathery detail.

Lastly, you can add further detail using a blow torch by creating more cells.

How to do a Dutch pour

That’s all there is to a Dutch pour.

I think it might sound more complicated than it actually is, so it may be easier to watch my YouTube video above which hopefully shows how to do this a whole lot better.

Please remember to check out my Etsy store for lots of handmade bits.

Thanks for taking the time to check out my project. If you have any questions, drop them below and I’ll happily get back to you.

Happy crafting x