Tyrian purple came to signify power and wealth and was used by both the Greeks and the Romans. It was complicated to make, involving using the mucus from thousands of murex snails, and cost a fortune.
The Greeks also manufactured white lead, the first fully opaque white — used to make flake white and Cremnitz white — which involved stacking lead strips in a confined space among vinegar and animal dung. Nice pigment, not so nice smell. With the rebirth of interest in artistry, the Italians threw themselves into developing the range of earth pigments by roasting siennas and umbers to make the deep, rich red of burnt sienna and the rich brown of burnt umber.
Earth colours featured heavily in their painting technique, with terre verte green earth the principal under-painting colour for flesh tones. One of the most astonishing pigments came from the semi-precious stone lapis lazuli, found largely in Afghanistan, and used to produce genuine ultramarine. It allowed artists to create a deep, rich blue and was the most expensive pigment in the world. The opening up of trade routes in the 18th century, coupled with advances in technology and science, allowed for greater experimentation.
In , the German colour maker Johann Jacob Diesbach created Prussian blue by accident in his laboratory. This became the first chemically synthesised colour. In , the chemist Jean-Baptiste Guimet created a low cost blue, French ultramarine. The artificial pigment is chemically identical to genuine ultramarine, but is physically finer and has none of the impurities of the lapis rock. The isolation of new elements in the late 18th century also played a part in providing new colours.
The discovery of large chrome deposits in North America in eased the manufacture of chrome yellow, a highly opaque, low cost colour available in a variety of hues. This new type of zinc oxide was called Chinese white. Alizarin is arguably the most important organic pigment of the 19th century. It was found as a colourant in the roots of the madder plant, but independent work in both Germany and Britain managed to duplicate it synthetically in the laboratory — the first time this had ever been achieved.
This more affordable synthetic pigment provided a blue shade crimson of strong tinting strength and high transparency, and was an immediate hit with artists.
These included Vandyke brown also called cassel earth , which came to prominence in the early s due to its popularity with the painter Van Dyke. Trade with India Two yellow pigments of note were introduced to Europe from the East around The trees were tapped by making incisions in the bark to let the gum drip out; the gum was then heated and run into hollow bamboo tubes where it was left to set. The hardened gum was removed for sale as hard sticks in Europe.
Gamboge was used as a watercolour pigment and was something of a novelty, being both a pigment and a binder combined into one. The second yellow pigment imported from the East was called Indian yellowl8, and was made in only one small region of India near Monghyr. The urine was collected and heated in order to precipitate the yellow colorant, which was then separated and formed into lumps ready for sale.
Indian yellow was used mainly in watercolours and was a bright, very light fast pigment. Its use only declined when the Indian government later banned its manufacture on the grounds of animal cruelty. Both of these yellow pigments were widely used by artists before they were replaced in this century by synthetic colorants that were more reliable. Industrial Pigments From the beginning of the 16th century a variety of synthetically produced blue pigments based on copper were used by artists. Blue verditer was the manufactured version of the pigment that occurred naturally as azurite, although it could also be produced as a green pigment akin to the green colour in malachite.
The method of synthesis for verditer was discovered accidentally, the pigment arising as an impurity in the separation of silver from copper. The process was little understood in the 16th and 17th centuries, and sometimes a blue pigment was made while other times it was green, and sometimes no colorant at all was seen.
It was not until the French chemist Pelletier analyzed verditer in the 18th century that a reliable method of production was generated. Smalt was obtained from grinding blue glass and had been used since Egyptian times, but very little was understood about the nature of the blue colour.
Consequently, the cobalt mines were rumoured to be inhabited by goblins called kobolds, who were blamed for causing all the mining accidents and arsenic poisoning. The name of the goblins was transferred to the metal ore and eventually to the metallic element itself.
After being mined, the cobalt ore was heated strongly in a furnace to drive off the arsenic in a white smoke. The cobalt oxide produced was then used to make the marvellous dark violet blue glass characteristic of smalt. The ground glass was used as a pigment up until the 19th century, and was even used as an early brightener for white clothes by laundresses.
References 1. Osborne, R. Lights and Pigments; London: John Murray, Gombrich, E. The Story of Art; 15th Ed. London: Phaidon, Leroi-Gourhan, A. Huyghe, R. London: Hamlyn, Ruspoli, M. Brodrick, A. Bataille, G. Prehistoric Painting; London: Macmillan, Sieveking, A. Windels, F. Laming, A. Lascaux: Paintings and Engravings; Harmondsworth: Penguin, Parkyn, E. Blum, A. Batsford, Sandars, N. Prehistoric Art in Europe, 2nd Ed. Powell, T. Prehistoric Art; London: Thames and Hudson, Harley, R.
Artists' Pigments , 2nd Ed. Feller, R. Kenrick, J. Fellows, Gardiner, A. Davis, W. Worringer, W. Egyptian Art; London: G. Putnam, Aldred, C. Smith, W. Stuart, V. Murray, Flinders Petrie, W. Encarta 97 Microsoft Weinstein, M. Precious and Semi-Precious Stones, 4th Ed. Webster, R. Innes, J.
Levey, M. Saltzman, M. M; and Christensen, J. Dyestuffs, 44 Abrahams, D. Dyestuff Rep. Grierson, S. The Colour Cauldron; Perth: Grierson, Selected Letters of the Younger Pliny, Ed. Merrill London: Macmillan, Pliny, C. Wright, N. Evans, A. Church, A. The Chemistry of Paints and Painting, 4th Ed.
London: Seeley, Ayres, J. The Artists' Craft; London: Phaidon, Mayer, R. Black, Hood, S. Pollitt, J. Carpenter, T. Walters, H. Imhoof Blumer, F. Ancient Greek Art and Iconography, Ed. Moon; Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, Coulson, W.
Boardman, J. Tompsett, D. Sepia; Liverpool: University Press of Liverpool, Gasparini, L. Bentor, Y. K; and Naster, K. Sedimentary Petrol. Buckley, H. R; and Farmer, V. Isager, J. Pliny on Art and Society; London: Routledge, Dunn in Treatise on Coatings, Vol.
Myers; New York: J. Long, Pigment Handbook, Vol. Patton; New York: John Wiley, Brown, O. Bailey; London: Arnold, Gettens, R. Studies in Conservation, 17 Woodford, S. Burn, L. DeRose Evans, J. Lendon, J. Hubert, J. Duby, G. Focillon, H. Betting, H. Ladner, G. Evans, J. Cole, B. Baxandall, M. Giotto and the Orators; Oxford: Clarendon Press, Welch, E.
Norm and Form, 2nd Ed. Castelfranco, G. Donatello; Firenze: Martello, Hart, F. Donatello; London: Thames and Hudson, Doerner, M. Neuhaus ; New York: Dover, Birren, F. Eastlake, C. Miller, Harbison, C. Jan van Eyck; London: Reaktion, Wright, C. Well how about getting them a pot of naturally made ultramarine paint. Coming into existence during the s, this intense blue was created using the mineral lapis lazuli and the color quickly infiltrated European palettes.
Originating in Afghanistan, where lapis lazuli was and still is mined, the color was achieved by separating the brilliant blue powder from the semi-precious stone. Even today, the natural version remains one of the most costly pigments around. In the early Renaissance, the main binding medium was egg yolk, which created a quick drying matt paint.
This meant the pigment had to be applied with distinctive brush strokes. Many famous artists around that time found themselves painting beyond their means with the color as the vibrant hue was admired by all.
For instance Johannes Vermeer used the pigment a lot in his works, so much so that it left his family in debt. A chemistry lab of color For all those cerulean lovers out there, a synthetic version of ultramarine was created in Before this, research into the creation of synthetic paint colors had been going on for decades as our understanding of chemistry advanced.
The first modern synthetic pigment is an old favorite, Prussian blue, which was discovered in the early s by accident when a chemist was trying to make red. It was long-lasting but darker than ultramarine — again it offered new possibilities for artists. By August , the pigment had been termed Preussisch blau. The Entombment of Christ, dated by Pieter van der Werff is said to be the oldest known painting where Prussian blue was used.
Over the next years many more artificial colors were introduced, along with the aforementioned ultramarine. Apart from the range of new colors available, another benefit of the new chemical processes was that it started to drive prices down.
By the end of the 19th century almost any color could be purchased for a relatively low price. The creation of industrially manufactured paints The use of paint continued to increase and manufacturers of industrial paints began to make emulsions, glossy enamel, and house paints. Artists like Pablo Picasso liked to use industrial paints alongside the more traditional oil brands, as they allowed him to create unique colors and different textures — he particularly liked a type of enamel paint made by a firm called Ripolin.
American abstract expressionist painter Jackson Pollock also favoured industrial paints. These paints were intended for spray painting cars or household decorating but the artist used this type of paint until his death in Acrylic paint was invented in the s and again transformed painting, quickly replacing oil in everyday paint.
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