Page 5 - Mediums
Painting mediums are used to modify the rate of drying, increase gloss, improve flow or add texture, mediums as an additive to color. Working with oils, solvents, mediums, and varnishes for painting requires an in-depth understanding of paint. The wide range of oils, mediums, and solvents to control color makes choices difficult.
Francisco Benitez considers himself an atemporal archaeologist who excavates lost and forgotten styles of painting long assigned to the shadows to reveal the ever-transient nature of the human psyche. Trained in a rigorous atelier program at the Art Student’s League in New York, he frequented museums and copied old master paintings to master their techniques and conceptual strategies...
Welcome to Natural Pigments' Glossary of common and not so common Paint and Art Terms. Here we hope to give you a brief definition of various art terms which might be unfamiliar. If you have any questions, comments, or ideas, please contact us...
Natural Pigments congratulates Julio Reyes upon winning the Draper Grand Prize at the 2012 International Portrait Competition for his painting Tread Softly. The finalists in the competition were announced at The Art of the Portrait conference Gala Banquet on Saturday, May 26, 2012, at the Sheraton Philadelphia Downtown Hotel...
Natural Pigments congratulates David Gluck for his painting, The Trapper, which won an Exceptional Merit award at the 2012 International Portrait Competition. The top finalists in the competition were announced at The Art of the Portrait conference Gala Banquet on Saturday, May 26, 2012, in the Grand Ballroom of the Sheraton Philadelphia Downtown Hotel. The painting The Trapper depicts a man David befriended when he moved into an old factory district in Toronto. When David knew him, the man did not have a job or home, but he kept himself extremely busy collecting scrap metal...
Dammar (or damar) or soft copal varnishes are soft, very flexible, and transparent but dry slowly. These varnishes have a bright appearance and a faint pale yellow color. The color may be varied from golden yellow to yellowish brown by gamboge, dragon's blood, and asphaltum...
To painters, discussing mediums can be like a political debate. There are pro-Maroger, anti-Maroger, pro-natural resins, and anti-natural resins, as well as pro-alkyd and anti-alkyd proponents. The disputes are always about potential cracking, lack of adhesion, and yellowing. I have always been the curious type and have experimented with almost every medium that I could get my hands on. However, if you are new to painting, the best approach is to experiment with the paint right out of the tube so that you can understand and fully integrate into your procedure what the paint can do without additives...
