So here’s another attempt at using Krylon’s UV Archival Varnish!
This time I decided to try two medium coats of varnish spaced 20 minutes apart (the can’s directions reads at least 10 minutes).
So the first coat went on smoothly. The second coat got put on 20 minutes later. At this point you could see a gloss buildup that you don’t see on two light coats of varnish. I pushed my luck and tried a third coat 4 hours later (Seeing the gloss buildup, I knew if I put another coat on after 20 minutes the coats underneath wouldn’t dry properly). Sure enough, the coating became tacky. So far it’s been 24 hours and the third coat is still a little tacky and it seems like there’s a huge difference in the varnish coating across the piece.
It seems the sides are more tacky than the center. The center seems to have cured properly and has a nice gloss to it without any change to the nature of the original colors.
One week later, the piece is still tacky and I’m guessing will forever be tacky.
This is why when using fixative with pastels I highly recommend you do as light of coats as you can spaced out well above the directions indicated times. It’s a pain in the ass, but worth it.
But I’m actually pretty happy with Krylon’s UV Archival Varnish so far. It works exactly like it says, the gloss isn’t overwhelming but still emphasizes your work, and it seems to create a proper barrier for your piece.
It works well with Sakura Specialist oil pastels without any color changes or tackiness.
However as previously stated, my piece made using sennelier oil pastels and Sakura Specialist oil pastels became tacky.
I haven’t tried this spray on a work entirely made from Sennelier oil pastels yet so I can’t promise you wont have any problems. I’ve heard on several occasions of Sennelier pastels becoming tacky with all kinds of different fixatives.
Be careful.