GARISH OR NOT

#ancientart #classicalgreekart #pigments #paintings

GARISH OR NOT

Part One of a series

Were ancient Greek temples statues and paintings BRIGHT LOUD COLORs or not ?

Lets start by looking at what pigments were actually available

YELLOW only from Sulphides

Yellow pigments from plants would not be suitable for painting on stone or would fade

YELLOW OCHRE  Available  used for Ceramics Frescos and probably painting

ORANGE Arsenic sulphide

RED Mercury Sulphide called Cinnabar

GREENS from Malachite or Azurite which had to be imported so expensive to use !

BLUE Smalt or Lapis Lazuli or Azurite

ALL EXPENSIVE TO import and process!

There could have been some use of woad from plants for blue but that would have been an import too.

Also Sulphide based pigments do not blend well with certain others ...

REDs and Yellows yes but Bright Greens and Blues

not unless whoever was paying for the painting was a wealthy city or aristocrat or merchant or a group thereof.

So here's what some of the pigments looked like

Lapis Lazuli ground up for mixing with mediums

Sulphides for reds and yellows in their raw form

Next post I will be discussing mineral ore pigments in greater detail

My perspective on this will be not just that of a classicist but also of an artist who has used a variety of paints for watercolor acrylic oils and pigments for ceramics too!