Paint and Its Surface

Binders and Media

What holds the pigment, and how each binder changes the paint

These pages take the main binders one by one: what each is made of, and what it lets a painter do.

• What a binder does
• Egg tempera
• Fresco
• Oil
• Watercolor and gouache
• Pastel
• Encaustic

Works in this part

• Madonna and Child
• Lion, from the Chapter House of San Pedro de Arlanza
• The Magdalen Reading
• The Return, Tynemouth (recto)
• Portrait of Maria Frederike van Reede-Athlone at Seven Years of Age
• Portrait of a young woman in red

Image: Made for this site · Original work