WHEN?Pigments in History A few years ago, the art world received this shocking piece of in-news one morning: Vantablack, an exciting new black pigment that had been all the buzz, had just been ‘bought’ by artist Anish Kapoor for his exclusive usage. A new colour is cause for much celebration and, by that, I mean…
Category: Hues in Tubes; everything you have always wanted to know about PAINT without daring to ask the shop assistant
Colors are not possessions
WHEN?Pigments in History “Colors are not possessions; they are the intimate revelations of an energy field… They are light waves with mathematically precise lengths, and they are deep, resonant mysteries with boundless subjectivity.” Isn’t Ellen Meloy’s definition of Colour in her Anthropology of Turquoise simply delicious? Still, we might as well admit it right now,…
C) Pigments (vs Colour)
WHAT?II. What’s in paint? One morning I woke up and told my husband: I’m going to write a book about colour! To which Vianney replied, being the tireless supporter of my wildest dreams (and privy to my darkest hours of doubt): That’s a great idea, but… do you know anything about colour? No, of course…
Art paint binders today
WHAT?II. What’s in paint?B) Binders Are you not amazed at the difference between these two paintings by Andrew Wyeth? Same talent, same subject, virtually the same angle, but the one on the left is painted with tempera on masonite and the other with watercolour on paper. The density of the board, the finesse of the…
Binders in order of appearance
WHAT?II. What’s in paint?B) Binders After this cycling detour, let’s go back to the beginning… oil will have to wait for quite a few centuries (millennia, to be fair) and have a look at binders in order of appearance.In most cases, it is hard to trace thousands of years back which binders have been used……
My introduction to binders
WHAT?II. What’s in paint?B) Binders Binder, when I first heard the word, was only evocative of books… something (thread + glue + leather embossed in gold?) that would efficiently keep the words tight, the folios in their intended order, the story making sense of this crazy world, perhaps. Could there be an analogy with binders…
Supports
WHAT?II. What’s in paint? You might be surprised that I include supports in our paint ingredients and as the very first one, too, but I have good reasons. This is where it all begins… and, in the end, not only will it have become part and parcel of your artwork but an integral part of…
The basic recipe
WHAT?II. What’s in paint? Despite all these superlatives, paint is, in fact, a rather simple material. (And yes, although I understand perfectly well that it’s a multi-ingredient affair, it still feels to me as if it’s the one material in the end… do you feel the same way?) You need a pigment or two or…
Is there a possible definition?
WHAT?I. What is paint? All of this said, can there even be a definition of paint? “Paint: A coloured substance which is spread over a surface and dries to leave a thin decorative or protective coating.” The Oxford Dictionary, obviously, has only been to the hardware store! You would hardly think of a Singer Sargent…
Paint is a concept
WHAT?I. What is paint? Paint is a concept, but surely you were all aware of that.In a hardware store, you might ask for paint for this or that. You are simply trying to find the best one for the support you have in mind to colour. In an art store, there might be some restrictions as to…
in bed with mona lisa 