Knowledge List of Oil Painting

Oil painting

from:reviewpainting

Oil painting is done on surfaces with pigment ground into a medium of oil — especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Other oils occasionally used include poppyseed oil, walnut oil, and safflower oil. These oils result in different properties in the oil paint, such as less yellowing or different drying times. The oil usually takes weeks to dry.
It was probably developed for decorative or functional purposes in the High Middle Ages. Surfaces like shields — both those used in tournaments and those hung as decorations — were more durable when painted in oil-based media than when painted in the traditional tempera paints. Many Renaissance sources credit northern European painters of the 15th century with the "invention" of painting with oil media on wood panel — Jan van Eyck often mentioned as the "inventor". The popularity of oil grew in 16th century Venice, where a water-durable medium was essential.
Recent advances in chemistry have produced modern water miscible oil paints that can be used with, and cleaned up in, water. These are still "real" oil-paints in every sense of the meaning. Small alterations in the molecular structure of the oil creates this water miscible property.
A still-newer type of paint, heat-set oils, remain liquid until heated to 265–280 °F (130–138 °C) for about 15 minutes. Since the paint never dries otherwise, cleanup is not needed (except when one wants to use a different color and the same brush). Although not technically true oils (the medium is an unidentified "non-drying synthetic oily liquid, imbedded with a heat sensitive curing agent"), the paintings resemble oil paintings and are usually shown as oil paintings.
The paintings are the excellent portrayal of the events and scenes that we see around us. The painters are the best cameras of the world. They reproduce many different types of pictures. They even draw imaginary pictures that do not exist in this world. We tend to use both thinned oil paints and dense oil paints. Masterpieces can be dyed more than once, but each time it may be different from the existing paintings.

Portraits: Custom hand painted oil painting in sync with your needs!

By: Doug C. Ames
from:celebritypainting

So what are oil paintings really all about? The following report includes some fascinating information about oil paintings--info you can use, not just the old stuff they used to tell you.
Once you begin to move beyond basic background information, you begin to realize that there's more to oil paintings than you may have first thought.
Exactly as you like it
Let is say you have a nice picture of you and your school friends, clicked by a professional photographer. The photo quality is excellent but you do notlike the uniforms you are all wearing! Or maybe you do nott like one of the girls in the picture! Well you do have an option now. You can create a custom oil painting with the exact details that you wish for! With photo editing software you can change the dresses you all are wearing in the picture and also delete the picture of the girl you do not want! Then simply take it to a professional artist who will recreate the image in an oil painting!
Combinations you will love!
Many a portrait artist of today specializes in recreating fabulous oil paintings from a variety of photographs. So let is say you love your smile in one photograph or your dress in another and the background in a third photograph, the artist can create a custom oil painting that is exactly as per your wishes! The final painting will be as life like as the original photograph and also have all the details you want in it! Thus these paintings are truly customized in the sense that they are as per your taste and liking! Costumes and themes
Maybe you have a favorite photograph of you and your baby. Now you want to create this memory into a fabulous oil painting! Well, if you wish to show yourself and your baby in a Biblical theme, you could provide a picture of a similar theme to your art maker. He or she will then combine these two pictures and create a custom oil painting which is exactly with the theme you want! Those who only know one or two facts about oil paintings can be confused by misleading information. The best way to help those who are misled is to gently correct them with the truths you're learning here.

Top 10 Oil Painting Tips

from:painting.about

Oil painting tips for professional results.
Oil paints are extremely versatile. They can be used thickly in impasto or extremely thinly in glazes; they can be opaque or transparent. Here are a few tips to help you get the most from your oils.
Oil Painting Tip 1:
Always lay your oil paints out on your palette in the same order so that, with time, you'll be able to pick up a bit of a colour instinctively.
Oil Painting Tip 2:
The proportion of oil (medium) should be increased for each subsequent layer in an oil painting – known as painting 'fat over lean' – because the lower layers absorb oil from the layers on top of them. If the upper layers dry faster than the lower ones, they can crack.
Oil Painting Tip 3:
Avoid using Ivory Black for an underpainting or sketching as it dries much slower than other oil paints.
Oil Painting Tip 4:
Pigments containing lead, cobalt, and manganese accelerate drying. They can be mixed with other colours to speed up drying and are ideal for under layers. (Student-quality paints usually contain cheaper alternatives to these pigments, generally labelled hues.)
Oil Painting Tip 5:
Use linseed oil for an underpainting or in the bottom layers of any oil painting done wet-on-dry as it dries the most thoroughly of all the oils used as mediums.
Oil Painting Tip 6:
Avoid using linseed oil as a medium in whites and blues as it has a marked tendency to yellow, which is most notable with light colours. Poppy oil is recommended for light colours as it has the least tendency to yellow (although it does dry slower).
Oil Painting Tip 7:
Don't dry your oil paintings in the dark. This may cause a thin film of oil to rise to the surface, yellowing it. (This can be removed by exposure to bright daylight.)
Oil Painting Tip 8:
If, as the paint on your palette dries it forms a lot of wrinkles, too much oil (medium) has been added.
Oil Painting Tip 9:
If you're not sure whether a bottle of mineral or white spirits is suitable for oil painting, put a tiny quantity on a piece of paper and let it evaporate. If it evaporates without leaving any residue, stain, or smell, it should be fine.
Oil Painting Tip 10:
If you want to clean away a layer of oil paint or oil varnish, use alcohol, which is a powerful solvent.

Getting the source: 19th-Century Artists' Oil Painting Materials and Techniques

from:icc-cci
By:Leslie Carlyle

Nineteenth-century academic-style paintings in Britain, Europe, and North America have gained notoriety for the technical problems they present not only aesthetically but also in terms of their conservation analysis and treatment. Other than the knowledge that bitumen was a popular pigment and that these paintings often appear to have a high resin content in the oil medium, until recently there has been little specific information available on the materials and techniques in use during this period.
Recognizing the dearth of technical information and the usefulness of developing an expertise in this area, in 1986 the then Director General of CCI, Wally Kozar, supported a research proposal to carry out a comprehensive investigation into documentary sources covering 19th-century artists' oil painting materials and techniques. At CCI, and elsewhere in Canada and North America, a large percentage of the 19th-century paintings being treated had been made or influenced by artists trained in Britain. Therefore, this investigation led naturally back to the United Kingdom. The work was carried out as PhD.-level research in the Technology and Conservation Department of the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London.
Figure 1
Figure 2
Approval for educational leave with allowance was granted in the fall of 1986, and the research began in January 1987. The thesis, entitled "A Critical Analysis of Artists' Handbooks, Manuals and Treatises on Oil Painting Published in Britain Between 1800 and 1900: with reference to selected eighteenth-century sources," was submitted in April of 1991, and was passed on September 25, 1991.
The books that were published in the 19th century on oil painting generally fall into three categories: instruction books on how to paint in oils; handbooks or reference manuals on materials, such as varnishes and pigments; and general compendiums on the arts. These books not only provided information to the amateur, but were also important sources for well-known artists and even for members of the Royal Academy. In addition, selected sources from the 18th century were studied, and further information was collected from general recipe books and from dictionaries of arts and manufacturers.
Two other important sources of information were the colourmen's retail catalogues, which listed the materials available throughout the century, and a series of bought ledgers from the colourman Roberson. The bought ledgers, which dated from 1828 through to 1900, recorded company purchases of materials such as oils, varnishes, pigments, and canvas. A high correlation was found between the introduction of new materials and their appearance in the colourmen's catalogues, the bought ledgers, and the oil painting manuals.

Most of the sources were rare books not available for lending; therefore, the research was carried out with a portable computer equipped with a flat-file database software package. All technical information relating to oil painting was entered in the appropriate categories: oils, varnishes, painting mediums, grounds, painting methods, pigments, etc. Each entry included the direct quote from the book. Summary fields allowed quick access to the materials listed or described. In some cases, the authors provided recipes as well as instructions for the application of various materials; these were also included in the database. Once data entry was completed, chronological and subject sorts were performed. It was then possible to look at the century as a whole, and to chart the materials in use, their popularity and demise, and the introduction of new materials.

This information can be particularly useful for interpreting paint cross-sections and the results of instrumental analyses, and for preparing representative samples in materials research. As well, this work can give some indication of why artists chose certain materials and why they used them in the manner that they did.

Although for many years conservators have had access to information on the components of a painting from their colleagues who carry out material analyses, why these materials are present has not always been elucidated. Documentary research can provide further insight. For example, in recent years fluorescence microscopy has illuminated the presence of many intermediate layers that were used in building up a painting, and newly available equipment for infra-red microspectrometry has identified materials in discrete layers of a cross-section. As a complement to this, the documentary research on painting manuals has provided information on the purpose of these layers and on the reasons artists selected specific materials for use.1

The database created during this PhD. research on artists' pigments has contributed further information relating to research reported in a previous CCI Newsletter article, "A Double-Sided Panel Attributed to Tom Thomson." In the article, author and Senior Conservation Scientist Ian N.M. Wainwright noted the presence of a mixture of lead sulfate and zinc white, which he recognized as "probably ... prepared or blended by a paint manufacturer rather than mixed by the artist." He continued, "We had not anticipated finding lead sulfate."2 A search through the pigment section of the database revealed that a new form of "Permanent White", which consisted of lead sulfate and zinc oxide, had been introduced in the last decades of the 19th century.
The first of the authors to describe this pigment mixture was Henry Seward in 1889: "Permanent flake white is a recent addition to the list of white pigments, and is manufactured under a patent granted to Messrs. Freeman & Co. It is composed of precipitated lead sulphate, mixed with zinc oxide, and submitted to great pressure, by which the bulk is considerably reduced and opacity obtained. The white is slightly different in tone to flake white, similar in body, and unalterable."3
More insight into the reasons for combining these two materials can be gained from A.P. Laurie, who provides an account of this pigment mixture: "These zinc oxide and lead sulphate paints are now being brought before house-painters and artists under various names such as, 'White Lead, Caledonia Park Works, Glasgow, ' 'Freeman's White, ' 'the New Flake White or Cambridge White, ' 'Marble White,' etc. They have the advantage of keeping their colour better in the impure air of large towns and gas-lighted. rooms .... Zinc White prepared the old way was believed by artists to flake off, but these new whites have shown no such tendency. They are also practically non-poisonous, and free from the disagreeable smell of white lead."4
Tom Thomson may have specifically chosen this white as a non-toxic and more durable alternative to lead white, or he may have been unaware of the ingredients in Permanent White and may simply have found that it served his purpose, was economical, and was easily available.

As Ian Wainwright suggested, "Further research and analysis are necessary to determine the extent to which Thomson and his contemporaries may have used lead sulfate, lead white, zinc white, or mixtures of them."5 It is to be hoped that such further research, coupled with what we know about Permanent White, will also inform us of Tom Thomson's and his contemporaries' intent in adopting this new white.
The information gained from this research into artists' materials and techniques also reveals the reasoning behind the use of resins in 19th-century academic-style paintings: painters felt it necessary to mix resins with their oil paint to achieve the translucency of the old masters, whose techniques they emulated. The difficulty that many conservators have experienced in cleaning such resinous paintings is further explained by 19th-century sources. Throughout the century, artists were advised to employ the same resin throughout their painting — if they used mastic resin as an addition to their medium, they should also use mastic resin in the final varnish. The same applied to copal resin — if it was used in the medium, then the painting should be varnished with it. Homogeneity in the use of resins was seen to be important, since the presence of different resins was believed to lead to cracking. There were some counter arguments, but generally the homogeneity theory appears to have been the most popular. This idea worked in reverse as well. In the 1890s, the then President of the Royal Academy, Sir Fredrick Leighton, wrote to author Arthur Church, "Is it not always better to have some resin in a picture throughout since it has to be varnished at the end?"6
The research on the instruction books, manuals, and treatises identified a number of themes that were important to 19th-century artists and their colourmen. Amongst the most prominent were the quality, authenticity, and durability of their materials. The concern with durability is most ironic for an age that produced some of the most unstable paintings of all time.
With this new information available on 19th-century oil painting materials and techniques, research does not have to be restricted to the identification of materials alone. Our understanding can also encompass aspects of the design and intended application of materials.
References
1. L. Carlyle, "British Nineteenth-Century Oil Painting Instruction Books: A Survey of Their Recommendations for Vehicles, Varnishes and Methods of Paint Application." Cleaning, Retouching, and Coatings, Preprints of the Contributions to the IIC Brussels Congress, 3-7 September 1990, pp. 76-80.
2. Ian N.M. Wainwright, "A Double-Sided Panel Attributed to Tom Thomson." CCI Newsletter, no. 7 (Mardi 1991): 12.
3. Henry Seward, Manual of Colours, Showing the Composition and Properties of Artists' Colours, with Experiments on Their Permanence. London: George Rowney & Company, [18891, p. 42.
4. A.P. Laurie, Facts About Processes, Pigments and Vehicles: A Manual for Art Students. London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1895, p. 49.
5. Wainwright, p. 12.
6. Correspondence from Lord Leighton (President of the Royal Academy) to Arthur Church (Professor of Chemistry at the Royal Academy from 1879 to 1911). Royal Academy Library, London, England.