LIGHTFASTNESS

There is much to be valued either way I suspect. We need images from the past to help us picture the past. Learning about the past is both useful and interesting. But we wouldn't want everything ever drawn! D

I know one chap who prepares his canvases using a mixture of acrylic primer and polyfilla. How long lasting that is I don't know but I suspect it will be decades before any ill effects, if any, appear. As Michael says, no need to get too hung up about it.

It makes sense to use materials of as near to archival quality as possible IF you're hoping your work will endure either beyond your lifetime, or for the next 2 years - because it's easily within the latter period that certain pigments can fade away to nothing. Art that is intended for the moment, and no longer, needn't meet the same test - or any test, necessarily; it can be digitally preserved, if the artefact itself has no inherent value. The Emin bed, for example, could be photographed and re-created - it's not necessary to cart the thing from exhibition to exhibition. If on the other hand this really is about lightfastness, which is not the same thing at all, then pictures that fade in a matter of months are unlikely to delight the person who paid for them - and my question would be why use materials you know to be inferior if you have the choice not to use them?

Yes David, I use Nescafé powder more or less diluted. It gives as many shades of a nice brown as watercolour. Marjorie, I don't know if tea can be used as concentrated as pure coffee powder. Anyway, it is sometimes the only "colour" I have at hand immediately when I am working in the living room, there is always a jar of Nescafé next to me. And I am enjoying what I am doing. :) Mia

Just a brief return (well: my INTENTION is to be brief, anyway): I understand the points about, basically, spontaneity, experimentation, not needing to last into the vast chasm of time (assuming we've got that long as a species) but when we do have such a range of lightfast materials I don't think the problem arises so much. E.g. - we all know that in watercolour (and this is where most lightfastness issues arise, though not all) Alizarin Crimson, used alone and in thin washes, will fade - probably, anyway. We know that Rose Madder Genuine fades. Aureolin is a touch questionable (mind you, I have used it) real Gamboge will fade, as will Opera Rose, and for those who use it or can even find it any more, Geranium Red. In oil, we know there's a question mark over Zinc White, especially applied in early layers, on flexible surfaces, and the fact that it's included in some other colours (eg, Georgian Naples Yellow, and some brands of Titanium White). In acrylic, there are very few such issues; in Gouache, a good many more. But - we've got Winsor Red, Quinacridone red and violet, permanent magenta and permanent rose (which usually are quinacridones), all the earth colours, whites in oil minus Zinc (available in Jackson's and Ken Bromley's own Titanium Whites, both excellent paints), pthalo colours (sorry Syd!) and viridian (sorry Syd again!), modern versions of Indigo, sepia, and Indian Yellow ... ultramarines, cobalts, ceruleans, synthetic earth colours (the Mars range) - and here are some of you blighters using coffee and tea! (Shh - I've used coffee as well, when basically mucking about.) My point is only this - you can make some good inks from ox-galls, say; we can play about with steamed stinging nettles as a pigment if we want to - some have; but you don't really need to sacrifice light-fastness, or as near as we can get to it, any more and restrict yourself to a limited range of colour - I know that Alizarin Crimson, for example, is unique (still use a little in oil), I know Rose Madder Genuine is beautiful (again, still use it occasionally in oil) and I understand people using them; but there are alternatives that will very nearly match them - and it's just as interesting to mix, say, a little Winsor Red with Quinacridone Violet and see what you get as it is to plunge into a colour which is very attractive when laid down, but can go brown in a matter of months. (And you can't get Aliz Crimson or Rose Madder Genuine in acrylic anyway, incidentally: the name may be the same, but the pigment isn't. And would anyone say there was a limited range of colours in acrylic? I rest my case - well, it was getting heavy.....)