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Alkyds and en plein air
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Message
Posted
I'm planning on painting en plein air this year. I went out for the first time once last year (I just posted the studio painting from it today: 'The Old Cart Lodge', under my name Caroline Greene) and I've somewhat optimistically entered the Pintar Rapido event this summer, so I need to get some experience fast!
My question is, if I use Liquin as my medium when painting outside, because it helps speed up the drying, does that mean I don't need to buy alkyd paints?
Edited
by ArtBean
Posted
Depends on the atmospheric conditions, how thickly you'll be painting, how much solvent you use..... plus what colours you'll be using. Liquin will speed drying when used with your usual oil paints, but it won't guarantee it will dry in a day, if for example you were to use Alizarin Crimson, or the Cadmiums, or Titanium White. I haven't used alkyds, although am intending to shortly, but even they aren't guaranteed to dry in a day. Probably your best bet would be to use alkyd white, Liquin, and avoid the slow-drying colours.
Incidentally, while it won't dry in a day, a relatively quick drying medium, which is also very satisfactory in use from a number of other points of view, is stand oil plus sansodor or Turpentine. I was surprised how quickly it dried - I do make my own stand oil, but it can be bought as well.
Posted
Yes, Liquin can be used with the alkyd colours, and if the work has to be handed in on the same day, that's certainly what I'd use - if I were going to do it, which I wouldn't! The only paints that you can guarantee would dry that fast would be the water-based ones (not oil, because they wouldn't - if anything, water miscible oil dries more slowly than the conventional type). So acrylic, watercolour, tempera, casein.
In oil, if it helps, the faster drying oils are Raw Sienna, Burnt Umber, Raw Umber, Flake White (if you can find it..., otherwise Alkyd White), Prussian Blue, and Cobalt Blue. Medium fast dryers are the Mars colours - brown, red, orange, yellow, black - Winsor/Pthalo Blue and Green, Chrome Yellow and Green (not so sure about the Hue colours of these, which they all are now: you won't find a genuine Chrome Yellow), Burnt Sienna, Cerulean Blue, Viridian, Terre Verte, Cobalt Violet. And Winsor Red dries faster than Cadmium Red.
And the really slow drying paints include Alizarin Crimson, Titanium and especially Zinc White, Yellow Ochre, French Ultramarine, the Cadmium colours, and Lamp and Ivory Black.
The above applies to conventional oils; the alkyds will behave similarly relative to each other, but do dry faster across the board- and the Liquin will help speed things along. Of course, if you were to paint very thinly, using only Turps/Low Odour Thinners, Sansodor, and it's warm where you're painting, you'll be giving yourself an even better chance of having a touch-dry painting by the end of the day - there's a US artist who specializes in that approach, and uses thick kitchen roll, the Bounty brand, to spread the paint: you could find yourself with a whole new technique - but I'd have a good practise first.
Posted
One advantage, I suppose, is that alkyds become viscid much faster, which is good for plein air alla prima painting. Regular oils may become overly wet if you're adding new strokes of paint, causing difficulties. So don't expect alkyds to become dry to the touch during a painting session, like acrylics. However, the fact that they soon become viscid in fresh air and sunshine is useful, I believe. It allows better control. One may add a fine stroke onto viscid paint and it sits there, because it doesn't float out. However, I haven't tried alkyds, so I don't know for sure. Because alla prima painting is so popular, one would have expected alkyds to overtake the market, but they haven't. I wonder why. They are decidedly better for lasure painting, too. They are pigment-rich and allow rich use of alkyd medium, whereas linseed oil medium must be handled with care. This allows for beautiful effects.
As a beside, I'm curious about Kusakabe's "Ultra-Fast Drying Medium", which is supposed to become dry to the touch in a few hours. It mustn't be mixed with other fast-drying mediums, because it might lead to averse consequences.
Mats
Posted
I think you and I, Mats, are going to have to invest in a set of alkyd paints so we can speak with greater authority.... I don't think either of us would want to claim them as the answer to all oil painting problems, but there's little doubt they do have much to offer..... whether colour presents one of those advantages I've no way of knowing from personal experience.
I haven't tried or even heard of this ultra-fast drying medium - and don't need it, as slow drying isn't a problem for me (in that it doesn't matter). In general, though, speeding up drying can have its own adverse consequences, whether one mixes mediums or not - cracking and wrinkling being two of them. I remember very elaborate mixes and mediums from years ago, prepared in double boilers, containing litharge and cobalt driers - all sorts of advantages were claimed for them, although some were quietly lethal .... at least alkyd paint, mediums and grounds won't poison you and pollute your immediate atmosphere (some of these things stank).
Posted
Of course, I regularly use alkyd medium--Liquin Original and Liquin Impasto, and I've recently used alkyd white, so I have gotten some insight. And yesterday I received from Japan Ceramic White (alkyd, strontium titanate) and Holbein Fast Drying White (alkyd). So I suppose every brush stroke I make in the future will contain alkyd medium. Liquin Impasto is wonderful for those who like "short" oil paint. Winsor & Newton earlier had a brand "Winsor & Newton Alkyd Oil Colours", which has been discontinued. So I suppose it didn't sell. Excerpt from "The Oil Colour Book" (2001) :
<blockquote style="margin: 0 0 0 40px; border: none; padding: 0px;">Dr. Marion Mecklenburg, Senior Research Scientist with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC, has been researching the stability of oil films since 1978, attempting to identify the factors that contribute to the most secure paint film possible. Winsor & Newton Alkyd Oil Colours have shown extraordinary stability and stretchability.
With few exceptions, tests on twenty-year old Winsor & Newton alkyds show the paint film remaining stretchable up to 10% before breaking. That’s amazing, considering that traditional oil colours of the same age exhibit stretchability of only 1-2%.
In addition to their superb working characteristics, their superior qualities as a colour for underpainting and for glazing, Winsor & Newton alkyds are proving to be remarkably stable and durable. (here)</blockquote>
The only point, as far as I can see, with an ultra-fast drying medium is that it's practical for plein air painters. I wonder how many fresh oil paintings have been damaged during transport(?). The Japanese have much good stuff, made by Holbein, Kusakabe, and Mazda (the car manufacturer). Mazda makes a "Super Oil Paint"--super quality. I think they have some good chemists over there. It was the car industry that gave us the pyrrole pigments, which are superb.
Mats
Posted
Generally, an absorbent ground would make it dry somewhat faster. I haven't noted any marked difference between Liquin Original and Liquin Impasto in drying times, that is, until it becomes dry to the touch. Of course, it takes longer time for impasto paint to cure properly. There is also Liquin Oleopasto, for those who prefer gooey paint. An aspect of this is that Liquin Impasto extends the amount of paint, which is good for impasto painters, who use a lot of paint. It makes the paint layer stronger and more beautiful, enhancing the trompe l'oeil effect (since light is let in through the paint layer). Bengt Lindström (Swedish, 1925-2008) used pure oil colour and often applied it in enormously thick layers. One day he forgot the painting in standing position. When he returned to the atelier the next day, all the paint had glided down onto the floor. Had he used Liquin Impasto, it wouldn't have happened. It is believed that many of his paintings will never cure properly, not in a thousand years. /Mats
http://www.hd.se/familj/2008/01/29/konstnaren-bengt-lindstrom-dod/
http://www.hd.se/familj/2008/01/29/konstnaren-bengt-lindstrom-dod/
Edited
by MWinther
Posted
Two quick points - Mats may remember his name, I've just forgotten it: there's a British painter who uses extremely thick oil paint: actually, there were two - one is Fred Cuming, and I have a feeling I've got that a bit wrong - can't help thinking of Cumin seed - and the other.... his name just won't come to me in any form. I think in both cases though, they used paint straight from the tube, with a minimum of medium. Painters who employ the knife rarely use medium of any kind, it seems - certainly I never do when using a painting knife. I've not had paint slurp horribly off the canvas yet..
And the other is that Winsor and Newton DO still make alkyd paint - it's called Griffin Alkyd - they sell it in trial sets, and one of them is on my to-do list (although I think the set contains black, which I virtually never use.... why do sets of paints always contain black?).
I've not used Liquin Impasto by the way, so can't answer that question with any authority - presumably its intent is to stiffen the paint so it holds the impasto shape while also speeding drying.... if you're wanting your painting to dry in one day, though (and I think you'll be lucky to achieve that whatever you do) I would avoid any impasto work. I agree with Mats about the ground - I think my recent painting on Ampersand board, which is absorbent without sucking the life out of the paint, dried somewhat faster than normal; but then I was using Mars colours, as I often do these days, which dry quickly anyway. (In passing, it's one of the very best surfaces, at least in terms of applying paint - and we're told it's of high archival quality too - that I've ever used.)
I cover some of this in my e-book Oil Paint Basics, but not least in view of interesting comments on these threads, from Mats especially, it's due for an update and revision. Oh the work.....!
Posted
Oh, and Mats - have you tried, given your enthusiasm for the products of the Far East, Shin Han oil paints? They're a Korean company, and I've had it in mind to try them for a while (trouble is, one can't try everything - either in terms of time or cost). Given the beauty of so much Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Thai and Korean artwork, and the way in which Chinese and Japanese scrolls have lasted in good condition for hundreds of years, it shouldn't surprise us that there is a deep well of expertise there. In fact there are many products worldwide which we just don't see in this country, or haven't tended to see. To take a quite different example, casein paints have a long and honourable tradition in the USA, and I believe they can now be found in Britain - but for years you just couldn't get them here, and had to import - I hesitate to go about that on an oil thread, but the principle is of interest.
Posted
My first oil paints was Marie's, a Chinese brand. I think they had a wax additive, because they produced a quite beautiful matte finish. They also have an artists line, but I don't think it's sold in Europe.
Shin Han oils include also secondary pigments, not absolutely lightfast, which is why they have 109(!) colours to choose from. This might seem overmuch, but the problem is that not all the three star (excellent) pigments are satisfactory. Many two star (very good) pigments have better pigment strength. For example, if you want to make an abstract with a violet hue, then cobalt violet won't do, because it turns grey as soon as you add a little white. This is suitable for landscape painters, but not for painters who struggle to get exactly the right hue. So that's why one must choose dioxazine purple/violet (pv23), which is arguably the best violet, although it is rated two star. Another example is toluidine red (two star), which is exactly the same hue as cadmium red deep, but with much better pigment strength.
Interestingly, Le Franc's toluidine red is now rated three star. So maybe the pigment has improved (if it's still the same). Daler Rowney Georgian, which is available here in Sweden, has dioxazine purple. However, they give it the same permanence rating as the cadmiums and pyrroles. (Daler Rowney, unlike other brands, gives iron oxides and earth colours an even higher permanence rating--four stars, which is logical.) The line also includes pyrroles and many other powerful pigments. The expensive brands don't include all these fine pigments.
So I'm beginning to question the fixation with the three star pigments. Maybe it is a form of snobbery. Evidently, not all chemists agree on the lightfastness of primary and secondary pigments. Toluidine red is produced extensively just because of its very good lightfastness, suitable for outdoor products. So what does it take, in indoor conditions, to make toluidine red or dioxazine purple to lose their brilliancy? The rating of pigments is not an exact science, and I don't believe they have been exposed to very realistic conditions. In fact, we evaluate colours on subjective criteria. To exemplify, Georgian yellows include these:
Naples Yellow (Zinc Oxide/Arylamide Yellow/Naphthol AS-OL/Yellow Iron Oxide/Titanium Dioxide, PW4/PY83/PR9/PY42/PW6)
Lemon Yellow (Arylamide Yellow 10G, PY3)
Cadmium Yellow Pale (Hue) (Arylamide Yellow GX/Arylamide Yellow 10G, PY73/PY3)
Primary Yellow (Arylamide Yellow GX, PY73)
Cadmium Yellow (Cadmium Zinc Sulphide/Arylamide Yellow 5G, PY35/PY74)
Cadmium Yellow Deep (Hue) (Arylamide Yellow/Arylamide Yellow 10G, PY83/PY3)
So these are generally mixes of pigments, which accounts for the lower status of the product (Georgian). However, the lightfastness is three star for all these hues, that is, the same as cadmium yellow proper. To all evidence, Georgian is a first class brand in terms of permanence. However, the line also include pigments, such as pyrroles and dioxazines, which are arguably better than what we find elsewhere.
So why shouldn't we choose certain of these cheaper brands which are regarded "student grade"? The only argument I can find is that (1) their paints contain mixed pigments, which is "indecorous" (2) the pigments are second rate because Rembrandt, Matisse, and Picasso didn't use them. So it is only a question of snobbery. There is absolutely no objective reason why we shouldn't use these mixtures of arylamides, disazos, pyrroles, naphthols and anthraquinones.
Mats
Edited
by MWinther
Posted
I do take your point Matts, and if you have an interest in the technical aspect, then why not, I haven't any or very little interest, most of my time is focused on the painting process, I tend to leave it to the manufacturers to get things right for me and perhaps foolishly I do trust them.
All I can say is that in 50+ years of serious oil painting I have yet to incur a problem, I still have dozens of oil paintings from my college years and they are no different now as they were then, and I suppose on a selfish note, I'm not terribly concerned that if in 100 years time my work starts to show signs of deterioration. I'm a realist on that score, my work will never be of a value that matters one iota, and in 100 years I will be long forgotten. What a dreadful thought, and on that note I will return to the studio.
Well done anyway for being able to absorb and have the interest to take all this technical stuff on board.