Why I Paint With Acrylic, Spray Paint and Oil (aka: Why I Refuse To Pick A Lane)

People sometimes ask why I use three completely different types of paint in one piece.

The polite answer is: because each one does a different job.

The honest answer is: because one paint alone simply cannot handle what I’m trying to do.

Acrylic is the structure

Acrylic is fast, obedient, and efficient. It lets me build the bones of a painting quickly - composition, colour blocking, movement, decisions.

It’s the part where the painting pretends it’s going to behave.

Acrylic is the scaffolding. The planning. The “yes, this is a serious artwork” phase. It dries fast enough that I can keep up with my brain, which is essential because my brain does not wait calmly for paint to dry.

Spray paint is the disruption

Spray paint is where things stop being polite. It introduces atmosphere, accidents, texture, softness, and sometimes outright vandalism.

It’s unpredictable, slightly feral, and refuses to stay inside neat little painterly rules. Spray paint is the moment the painting stops being a picture of something and starts becoming a place you could fall into.

It’s also the stage where I usually step back, stare at the piece, and say something along the lines of “right… let’s ruin this beautifully.”

Oil paint is the soul

Oil paint is slow, rich, dramatic, and absolutely shameless about it.

It lets me pull depth out of the painting - real depth. The kind where petals feel thick, shadows feel heavy, and light feels like it’s actually landing on the surface.

Oil is where I push the realism, the emotion, the velvet darkness, the glow, the decay. It’s the final layer that makes the work feel like it’s breathing instead of just sitting there looking decorative.

Acrylic builds it. Spray paint unsettles it. Oil makes it undeniable.

So why all three?

Because my paintings aren’t meant to feel neat. They’re meant to feel alive. Layered. Complicated. A little bit unstable in a way that somehow still holds together.

Using just one medium would make the work simpler. Cleaner. More predictable.

And honestly?

That’s just not the world I’m painting.

In short - acrylic gives the painting a body. Spray paint gives it a nervous system. Oil gives it a pulse.

And once all three are in the room, the work usually takes on a life of its own.

Which is exactly the point.

-The BatshXt Botanist

The work doesn’t behave. You don’t have to either.