Paintings
Mark Jefferson G. Pason & Yra May Secretario
Painting is a specialized form of drawing that refers to using brushes to apply
colored liquids to a support, usually canvas or paper, but sometimes wooden
panels, metal plates, and walls. For example, Leonardo da Vinci painted Mona
Lisa on a wood panel. (Figure 2.7) Paint is composed of three main ingredients:
pigments, binders, and solvents. The colored pigments are suspended in a sticky
binder in order to apply them and make them adhere to the support. Solvents
dissolve the binder in order to remove it but can also be used in smaller
quantities to make paint more fluid. As with drawing, different kinds of painting
have mostly to do with the material that is being used. Oil, acrylic, watercolor,
encaustic, fresco, and tempera are some of the different kinds of painting. For the
most part, the pigments or coloring agents in paints remain the same. The thing
that distinguishes one kind of painting from another is the binder.
Oil Painting
Oil painting was discovered in the fifteenth century and uses vegetable oils,
primarily linseed oil and walnut oil, as the binding agent. Linseed oil was chosen
for its clear color and its ability to dry slowly and evenly. Turpentine is
generally used as the solvent in oil painting. The medium has strict rules of
application to avoid cracking or delamination (dividing into layers).
Additionally, oil paint can oxidize and darken or yellow over time if not
properly crafted. Some pigments have been found to be fugitive, meaning they
lose their color over time, especially when exposed to direct sunlight. This can be
seen in a detail of Leonardo’s Mona Lisa where the figure’s eyebrows and eye
lashes are now “missing.”
Mona Lisa
Artist: Leonardo da Vinci
Author: User “Dcoetzee”
Source: Wikimedia Commons
License: Public Domain
Detail of the eyes of Mona Lisa
Artist: Leonardo da Vinci
Author: User “Cantus”
Source: Wikimedia Commons
License: Public Domain
Acrylic and Watercolor Painting
Acrylic painting is relatively modern and uses water-soluble acrylic polymer as the binding agent.
Water is the solvent. Acrylic dries very quickly and can be used to build up thick layers of paint in a
short time. One problem with acrylic is that the colors can subtly change as it dries, making this
medium less suitable for portraiture or other projects where accurate color is vital. Nevertheless,
acrylic paint is preferred over oil paint by many artists today, in part due to its greater ease of use
and clean up, and because its rapid drying time allows the artist to work at a faster pace.
Watercolor painting suspends colored pigments in water-soluble gum arabic distilled from the Acacia
tree as the binder. Watercolor paints are mixed with water and brushed onto an absorbent surface,
usually paper. Before the industrial era, watercolor was used as an outdoor sketching medium
because it was more portable than oil paint, which had to be prepared for use and could not be
preserved for long periods or easily transported. Today, however, many artists use watercolor as their
primary medium.
The Sponge Diver
Artist: Winslow Homer
Author: User “Botaurus”
Source: Wikimedia Commons
License: Public Domain
Encuastic Painting
Encaustic uses melted beeswax as the binder and must be
applied to rigid supports like wood with heated brushes. The
advantage of encaustic is that it remains fresh and vibrant
over centuries. Encaustic paintings from ancient Egypt dating
to the period of Roman occupation (late first century BCE-third
century CE) are as brilliantly colored as when they were first
painted.
Portrait of the
Boy Eutyches
Source: Met Museum
License: OASC
Fresco Painting
Fresco is the process of painting onto plaster; it is a long-lasting technique. There
are two kinds of fresco: buon fresco, or “good” fresco, is painting on wet plaster, and
fresco secco, or dry fresco, is done after the plaster has dried. Paintings made using
the buon fresco technique become part of the wall because the wet plaster absorbs the
pigment as it is applied. The only way to correct a buon fresco painting is to chip it
off the wall and start over. Buon fresco must be done in sections. Each section is
called a giornate, which is Italian for “a day’s work.” Because it is done on dry
plaster, fresco secco is more forgiving, but also less permanent as changes in moisture
levels or damage to the wall can harm the painting. Due to the dry air and stable
weather, there are fresco secco murals created as early as 3,000 BCE in ancient
Egyptian tombs that remain largely intact.
The Expulsion of Adam
and Eve from Eden
Artist: Massacio
Source: Wikimedia Commons
License: Public Domain
Nebamun Tomb Fresco
Dancers and Musicians
Author: User "Fordmadoxfraud"
Source: Wikimedia commons
License: Public domain
Tempera Painting
Tempera painting has been around for centuries. The most popular
version of painting during the Middle Ages was egg tempera, in
which dry colored pigments were mixed with egg yolk and applied
quickly to a stable surface in layers of short brushstrokes. Egg
tempera is a difficult medium to master because the egg yolk
mixture dries very quickly, and mistakes cannot be corrected
without damaging the surface of the painting. The Birth of Venus
by Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510, Italy) is an egg tempera painting.
The Birth of Venus
Artist: Sandro Botticelli
Author: User "Decoetzee"
Source: Wikimedia Commons
License: Public domain
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