dried acrylic paint in brushes

[udonandbroth]

how do I get dried acrylic paint out of my brushes? most of them are animal fur, I think. ugh, my daughter got into my paint and left paint on the brushes. Are they totally ruined?

[PreggieUBA2C]

I am sorry to tell you that your brushes are indeed ruined

Natural hair brushes will deteriorate if used with acrylic paints (which is- simplistically- pigments and dyes in plastic and petroleum-based solvents); always use synthetic brushes for acrylics if you don't want to replace them continuously.

They will be ruined even if you wash them out if you used acrylics, but if they've dried, there is nothing you can do to restore them. Even if you did dissolve the acrylic, the hairs would most likely disintegrate simultaneously.

The only exception to this rule is hog hair (you wrote 'fur' so I was responding with the assumption that you're referring to soft hairs- squirrel, martin, sable, etc...- not hog), but even then, sythetics will last longer with acrylics than hog hair since you would be relying on the inherent physical strength of the hair to withstand or tolerate the petroleum solvents.

Best just to use natural with natural, synthetic with synthetic, imo.

[udonandbroth]

Thanks for the info. I will throw my brushes out and buy some different ones!