Pigment, assortment of 17 colors

Natural or synthetic, pigments are coloured particles that need to be loosened and bound. Several techniques of use are possible: medieval tempera, arabic gum or egg yolk.

With medieval tempera, place a small amount of pigment on a sandblasted glass or ceramic plate. Add a few drops of tempera (variable, depending on the nature of the pigment), and grind the mixture, either with a glass muller or simply with a painter’s knife, until you obtain a soft and very smooth dough, which you can use immediately, or also store in plastic pans and let dry : the color will keep without problem and can be reused later by wetting with water.

For the technique of egg yolk, the excellent book by Claire Travers « Initiation à l'enluminure », gives you all the indications : this book, unfortunately out of print now, was published in compilation with the book « Latin calligraphy », you can consult it here.

Arabic gum is used almost as a tempera, except that it is necessary to add a few drops of sugar solution to give flexibility to the mixture, which would otherwise become too « brittle » when drying (proportion for sugar syrup: 1 volume of water for two volumes of sugar)