Acrylic Painting Courses I'd Recommend to a Friend

Acrylic painting dries in minutes — and that single fact changed everything for self-taught artists. Oil paints demand patience measured in days. Watercolor punishes every mistake. But acrylics let you layer, correct, and keep moving. Finish a painting on a Tuesday night. Start another on Wednesday.

That speed and flexibility made acrylics the most popular studio painting medium on earth. They work on canvas, wood, paper, fabric, and just about anything else you'd put in front of a brush. And yet — standing in front of a blank canvas with a brand-new set of tubes still feels daunting.

That's what this guide is for. There are 345+ acrylic painting courses on TutorialSearch alone, plus thousands of YouTube tutorials and entire shelves of books. None of that tells you what to actually pick first. This does.

Key Takeaways

• Acrylic painting dries fast, forgives early mistakes, and works on almost any surface — making it the best starting medium for new painters.
• The top acrylic painting courses focus on real skills: color mixing, layering, and understanding how paint behaves differently when wet versus dry.
• Free resources like The Art Sherpa and Will Kemp Art School rival paid courses in quality — and there are hours of them available right now.
• Books like Painting in Acrylics: The Indispensable Guide give you the depth that video tutorials routinely skip.
• The acrylic painting community on Reddit and WetCanvas will give you honest feedback, which matters more than passive consumption.

In This Article

• The Acrylic Painting Courses Worth Taking
• Free Acrylic Painting Lessons That Don't Waste Your Time
• Acrylic Painting YouTube Creators Who Actually Teach
• Acrylic Painting Books Worth Opening
• Which Acrylic Painting Format Fits the Way You Learn
• The Acrylic Painting Communities Where Artists Actually Help
• Related Acrylic Painting Skills Worth Exploring
• Frequently Asked Questions About Acrylic Painting

The Acrylic Painting Courses Worth Taking

Most acrylic painting courses fall into a predictable trap: they teach you to copy a specific painting rather than understand what you're doing. You end up with a finished piece but no idea how to start your own. The courses below avoid that problem.

1. Acrylic Painting: Learn the Basics For Beginners — LaurieAnne Gonzalez (Skillshare) [Editors' Choice]

Nearly 50,000 students have taken this course, which makes it the most popular beginner acrylic painting course available anywhere. LaurieAnne's approach is methodical without being dry. She covers brush types, paint consistency, how to build layers, and color theory — in that order, which is the right order. The projects are practical rather than decorative, meaning you come out understanding why you made each choice. Rating: 4.36/5.

2. Acrylic Painting for Beginners — Malcolm Dewey (Udemy) [Editors' Choice]

This is the highest-rated course in the group at 4.58/5, and it earns that score honestly. Malcolm Dewey is a painter who teaches painting — not someone who has figured out how to record videos. He's direct about what actually trips beginners up: overworking wet paint, using too much water, not letting layers dry. If you prefer Udemy's lifetime-access model over Skillshare's subscription, start here.

3. Acrylic Painting - Introduction to Acrylic Painting — Rod Moore (Udemy)

Rod Moore takes a slower, more deliberate pace than other instructors, which some learners find reassuring and others find too cautious. Worth noting: he spends a full section on color theory that most beginner courses treat as an afterthought. With 12,625 students and a 4.41 rating, it's proven itself. If you struggle with color decisions, this is the one to pick.

4. Acrylic Painting: How To Paint An Abstract Landscape — LaurieAnne Gonzalez (Skillshare)

If landscapes are what drew you to painting, this is a natural step after the basics course. LaurieAnne walks through abstract interpretation — how to take a reference image and make deliberate choices about simplification, color harmony, and composition. Over 10,000 students. Rating: 4.39/5.

5. Acrylic Painting: How To Paint Using A Limited Color Palette — LaurieAnne Gonzalez (Skillshare) [Editors' Choice]

This is actually the one I'd give an intermediate painter first — before they went out and bought 40 tubes of paint. The limited palette concept forces you to mix, understand undertones, and make conscious color decisions. Most painting problems beginners face trace back to working with too many colors at once. Rating: 4.51/5.

6. Acrylic Colour Mixing - Making the Most of Your Colours! — Joy Fahey (Udemy)

Color mixing is the skill that separates painters who grow from painters who plateau. Joy Fahey's course on Udemy is laser-focused — it doesn't try to teach you everything about acrylic painting, just the one thing most beginners neglect. Rating: 4.45/5, which for a specialized course is impressive.

7. Acrylic Painting: How To Create A Mixed Media Painting — LaurieAnne Gonzalez (Skillshare)

If you're interested in combining acrylics with other materials — collage, charcoal, fabric — this opens that door. Mixed media art is a big category with 981+ courses, and this one gives you a grounded introduction to integrating acrylics within it. Rating: 4.40/5.

8. Acrylic Painting: Playing with Inspiration, Color, and Form — Amber Vittoria (Skillshare)

Amber Vittoria is a working illustrator, and that shows. This course is less about technique and more about developing an artistic voice — how to look at the world and translate it into color and form. It's not for day one. Come back to it after you've done a few foundational projects. Rating: 4.16/5.

A few more worth browsing: Acrylic Painting Essentials For Beginners With Easy Step-By-Step Project by ROBERT JOYNER (Skillshare) and Acrylic Painting: The Ultimate Canvas Painting Course by Art & Craft Letstute are solid options if you want more variety. You can search the full catalog at TutorialSearch.io.

Free Acrylic Painting Lessons That Don't Waste Your Time

Everyone recommends starting with paid courses because free resources are supposedly scattered and low-quality. That's wrong, at least for acrylic painting.

The Art Sherpa — Cinnamon Cooney's site has 600+ free video lessons, and she runs live paint-along sessions that feel like an actual class. Her teaching style is warm and transparent about her own mistakes. If you want to get moving without spending anything, this is your starting point.

Will Kemp Art School — Will Kemp takes a more structured approach than most YouTube educators. His free video library covers the same material as many paid beginner courses: brush handling, layering, blending, canvas prep. Over 24 million YouTube views says something. The depth on his site — especially around color mixing — is legitimately good.

Step By Step Painting — Run by Tracie Kiernan, a certified art teacher. This site shows you finished paintings alongside the full step-by-step breakdown, with photos at each stage rather than just video. Good for people who learn better at their own pace.

Free Painting Tutorials — A clean site with structured lessons across beginner and intermediate levels, covering both acrylics and oils. Not flashy, but the content is solid.

Jerry's Artarama Free Lessons — Jerry's is an art supply store, but their free video library features actual professional artists teaching technique. Practical, no-nonsense instruction across a range of subjects.

Artchive Acrylic Tutorials — Covers material selection, surface prep, and technique fundamentals in article format. Better than most "beginner guide" blog posts because it actually explains the why behind each recommendation.

If you want to explore beginner art more broadly, there are 558+ courses across skill levels on TutorialSearch in that category alone.

Acrylic Painting YouTube Creators Who Actually Teach

There are thousands of acrylic painting videos on YouTube. Many of them are paint-along videos that entertain without teaching. The creators below actually explain what they're doing.

The Art Sherpa — Cinnamon Cooney built the biggest beginner-focused acrylic painting channel on YouTube, with well over a million subscribers. Her live streams are a good way to paint alongside someone in real time, which helps more than watching a finished tutorial.

Angela Anderson — Angela's channel covers a range of art subjects, but her acrylic painting tutorials stand out for clear explanations of technique. She's patient without being slow, and she regularly breaks down the specific brush strokes she's using and why.

ExploreAcrylics — Mark Waller is a professional artist with 40+ years of experience, and it shows. The channel covers techniques you won't find on beginner channels: underpainting, optical color mixing, palette knife work as a core tool rather than an accent. Not for day one — but essential after you've got the basics.

Michelle the Painter — Hundreds of free paint-along sessions in the "Paint 'n Sip" style. If you want to make something specific — flowers, a sunset, a portrait — this channel has probably done it. Low-pressure, high output.

MyModernMet's YouTube channel roundup covers 30 painting channels if you want to explore beyond this list. And if you're drawn to illustration more broadly, the illustration techniques category on TutorialSearch has 1,354+ courses that complement painting skills.

Acrylic Painting Books Worth Opening

Videos show you what to do. Books make you understand why.

Painting in Acrylics: The Indispensable Guide — Lorena Kloosterboer [Editors' Choice]

This is the book I'd put in a beginner's hands before any course. It covers how acrylic paint actually works at a molecular level (briefly and clearly), how additives change paint behavior, and how to build a studio setup that scales as you improve. Detailed without being overwhelming. The chapter on mediums alone is worth the price.

Lee Hammond's Big Book of Acrylic Painting — 192 pages, 80+ step-by-step demos covering still lifes, landscapes, portraits, and animals. Dense and practical. Think of it as a workbook you keep returning to rather than a cover-to-cover read.

The Compendium of Acrylic Painting Techniques — Gill Barron. 170+ pages of documented techniques with exercises built in. Good for systematic learners who want to actually practice each concept before moving on.

Learn to Paint in Acrylics With 50 Small Paintings — Mark Daniel Nelson. A self-teaching book built around small, low-stakes exercises. The "50 small paintings" format is smart: each one focuses on a specific skill, and finishing 50 things builds confidence that watching videos simply cannot.

The Goodreads acrylic painting shelf has community reviews if you want to dig into more options.

Which Acrylic Painting Format Fits the Way You Learn

Not everyone learns the same way. Here's how to choose your starting format honestly.

There's no wrong answer here. Most painters end up using multiple formats anyway — a course to build the foundation, YouTube to find inspiration, a book to go deeper on specific problems.

The Acrylic Painting Communities Where Artists Actually Help

One thing no course can give you is honest feedback on your own work. That's what communities are for.

r/Painting — Active community where painters share work-in-progress and finished pieces. The feedback culture is constructive rather than competitive. If you post a painting and ask specific questions, you'll get specific answers.

r/learnart — Focused specifically on skill development. The wiki covers color theory, drawing fundamentals, and painting techniques in organized depth. Better than most beginner guides because it's community-tested over years.

WetCanvas — One of the oldest artist forums online. The acrylic painting section is active and populated by artists at every level, including professionals. The quality of critique tends to be higher here than on general social media platforms.

ArtistForum.com — Smaller but focused specifically on painting mediums. The acrylic subforum is a good place to ask technique questions and get answers from people who actually work in the medium.

Art Prof Discord — A moderated server with staff from Art Prof, a nonprofit art education platform. Good for getting structured feedback without the noise of a large general server.

If you're also curious about related mediums, watercolor techniques and watercolor illustration are both active learning areas on TutorialSearch — and many acrylic painters eventually try both.

Related Acrylic Painting Skills Worth Exploring

Acrylic painting connects naturally to several adjacent skills. These are worth exploring once you've built a foundation:

• Illustration Techniques — 1,354+ courses covering composition, line work, and design principles that make your painted work stronger overall.
• Mixed Media Art — 981+ courses on combining acrylics with other materials. A natural extension once you're comfortable with paint alone.
• Watercolor Illustration — 1,095+ courses. Many painters develop both skills, since the transparent layering logic of watercolor changes how you think about acrylic color mixing.
• Creative Expression — 661+ courses focused on finding and developing your own artistic voice rather than replicating specific styles.
• Procreate Illustration — 571+ courses. Digital painting skills transfer in surprising ways to traditional media and vice versa. Many working illustrators move fluidly between the two.
• Beginner Art — 558+ courses if you want a broader foundation before specializing.
• Photoshop Techniques — Useful for photographers who paint and painters who photograph their work for digital editing.
• Watercolor Techniques — 653+ courses covering the transparent medium that most acrylic painters eventually want to try.

Frequently Asked Questions About Acrylic Painting

How long does it take to learn acrylic painting?

You can make something you're proud of in your first session. Real competence — where you understand why things are working rather than just copying what someone else did — takes around 3 to 6 months of consistent practice. At one or two sessions per week, most beginners see clear improvement within 2 months.

The accelerating factor is painting regularly in between watching tutorials. Watching without painting is the most common reason progress stalls. You can find a wide range of acrylic painting courses on TutorialSearch to keep that practice focused.

Do I need drawing skills to start acrylic painting?

No — you don't need strong drawing skills to begin. Acrylics are forgiving enough that you can sketch lightly on canvas, paint over errors, and adjust as you go. Abstract and landscape painting especially don't require precise draftsmanship. That said, basic compositional understanding (where to place the focal point, how to balance a scene) helps from the start and improves naturally as you paint more.

Can I get a job or sell work with acrylic painting skills?

Yes — and more realistically than most art paths. Acrylic painters sell original work on Etsy and at local markets, license artwork for commercial use, teach classes, and take commissions. The supplemental income side is genuinely accessible for anyone willing to put in the time. Professional illustration work and gallery representation require more focused development, but the barrier to selling something is genuinely low.

Is acrylic painting good for beginners compared to other mediums?

Acrylic painting is usually the best starting point for most beginners. Oil paints require solvents, have longer drying times, and have stronger odors — which adds friction for home studios. Watercolor is technically demanding because mistakes are difficult to correct once dry. Acrylics sit in the middle: they can be used thickly like oils or thinned to behave almost like watercolor, they dry quickly, and they clean up with water. If you're exploring related mediums, watercolor illustration is a natural comparison worth reading up on.

What materials do I actually need to start?

A basic starter kit: a small set of acrylic paints (primary colors plus black and white), a few brushes (one flat, one round, one smaller detail brush), a canvas or two, a palette (a ceramic plate works fine), and two cups of water. That's it. You don't need a palette knife, easel, or gesso to begin — those come later. Student-grade paint from brands like Liquitex Basics or Golden Open is perfectly fine for learning.

How does acrylic painting differ from watercolor?

The key difference is opacity and reversibility. Acrylics dry opaque (unless heavily thinned) and become water-resistant after drying — meaning you can paint light colors over dark ones. Watercolor is transparent and stays water-soluble, so mistakes show through and light areas must be planned in advance. Many painters find acrylics more flexible for exactly this reason. The watercolor techniques category on TutorialSearch has 653+ courses if you want to compare the two directly.

The best move right now is a simple one: pick one course, get a small canvas, and put something on it before the week ends. Watching tutorials without painting is the trap most beginners fall into. The paint teaches you things the screen can't.

Start with LaurieAnne Gonzalez's beginner course if you want structure, or head to The Art Sherpa if you want to start for free tonight. Either way — pick up the brush.