Watercolor (American English) or watercolour (Commonwealth English; see spelling differences), also aquarelle (; from Italian diminutive of Latin 'water'), is a painting method"Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to the Stone Age when early ancestors combined earth and charcoal with water to create the first wet-on-dry picture on a cave wall." in which the paints are made of pigments suspended in a water-based"Ancient Egyptians used water-soluble translucent paints to decorate papyrus scrolls. They used such earth pigments as ochres and siennas, as well as minerals like reds, cinnabar, blue azure, green malachite, and so on, with gum arabic and egg white. Technically, these water-soluble colors were watercolors." solution. Watercolor refers to both the medium and the resulting artwork.
The conventional and most common support—material to which the paint is applied—for watercolor paintings is paper, usually special types of watercolor paper. Other supports or substrates include stone, ivory, silk, reed, papyrus, bark papers, plastics, vellum, leather, fabric, wood, and watercolor canvas (coated with a gesso that is specially formulated for use with watercolors). Watercolor paper is often made entirely or partially with cotton."100% cotton papers are more absorbent in most brands, but there are papers that have only 50% cotton or even high quality papers, which have no blending with cotton." This gives the surface the appropriate texture and minimizes distortion when wet. Watercolor papers are usually cold-pressed papers that provide better texture and appearance. Another variation is hot-pressed watercolor paper, which has a smoother texture and appearance than cold-pressed paper. Transparency is the main characteristic of watercolors. It is caused by the gum binder being absorbed by the paper, leaving a top layer of dispersed pigment particles, through which the paper shimmers. "It consists of a mixture of pigments, binders such as gum arabic and humectants such as glycerin, which together with other components, allow the color pigment to join and form the paint paste, which we know as watercolor. With regard to the colors, the quality of the pigments and their degree of concentration, it is what determines how good the watercolor is and also its price. A paint that has a high concentration of pigment, professional type, allows us to use it with a large amount of water without losing the intensity of color." Watercolors can also be made opaque by adding Chinese white. In the 19th century this could be controversial, and not regarded as "true watercolor" in the English tradition,"Turner himself was of the same opinion; he declared to me [Munro] that water-colour painting would be totally mined, and lose all its individuality and beauty by the bad practice of mingling opaque with transparent colour." but by about 1880 this dispute was over.
Watercolor paint is an ancient form of painting, if not the most ancient form of art itself. In East Asia, watercolor painting"With the discovery of paper in China around 2000 years ago, the watercolor media took a different route in which the color of the paper played an important role." with inks is referred to as brush painting or scroll painting. In Chinese, Korean and Japanese painting"Watercolors on silk were frequently used by Chinese and Japanese artists. Their artworks often included calligraphy as well as peaceful nature scenes, animals, and pictures of everyday life." it has been the dominant medium, often in monochrome black or browns, often using inkstick or other pigments. India, Ethiopia and other countries have long watercolor painting traditions as well.
As well as the growing importance of finished watercolors, especially in England from the later part of the 18th century, many Western artists used watercolor primarily as a sketching tool in preparation for the "finished" work in oil or engraving. Until the end of the eighteenth century, traditional watercolors were known as 'tinted drawings',"They had a limited range of colours that did not replicate those found in nature and the colours were never applied at their maximum intensity. and calling watercolor paintings "drawings" persisted until at least the 20th century in some quarters. The development of high quality color lithography by the end of the 19th century made possible attractive reproductive prints of watercolors, which have remained common, especially of landscape and still-life subjects.
History Watercolor art dates back to the cave paintings of Paleolithic Europe"In its simplest form, watercolour was used in Europe more than 10,000 years ago when cave-dwellers of the Upper Palaeolithic era mixed red earth with water and used it to paint pictures of hunters and their prey on the cave walls." and has been used for manuscript illustration since at least Egyptian times, with particular prominence in the European Middle Ages."Monks used watercolor and body color to brighten hand-written texts and manuscripts during the European Middle Ages. However, its continuous history as an art medium begins with the Renaissance. The German Northern Renaissance artist Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528), who painted several fine botanical, wildlife, and landscape watercolors, is generally considered among the earliest examples of watercolor."The origins of European watercolor, as we understand it now, may be traced back to the Northern Renaissance. Albrecht Durer (1471-1528), a German artist, was among the first to discover the possibilities of this medium. An important school of watercolor painting in Germany was led by Hans Bol (1534–1593) as part of the Dürer Renaissance.
Despite this early start, watercolors were generally used by Baroque easel painters only for sketches, copies or cartoons (full-scale design drawings)During the Baroque era, watercolor was frequently used to decorate naturalist books, albums, and scientific publications, as well as to create hand-painted maps and building drawings. Watercolor portraiture on paper, vellum, and ivory was also quite popular. Notable early practitioners of watercolor painting were Van DyckAnthony Van Dyck (1599–1641), a Flemish artist, improved the watercolor painting method by incorporating transparent washes. This was a noteworthy advance in which painters allowed the color of the paper to show through pigments and play a major role in the artwork. . (during his stay in England), Claude Lorrain, Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione, and many Dutch and Flemish artists.Watercolor was practiced by such masters as Claude Lorrain (1600 or 1604/5–1682), Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione (1609–1664), and many more Dutch and Flemish baroque artists. . However, botanical illustration and wildlife illustration perhaps form the oldest and most important traditions in watercolor painting. Botanical illustrations became popular during the Renaissance, both as hand-tinted woodblock illustrations in books or broadsheets and as tinted ink drawings on vellum or paper. Botanical artists have traditionally been some of the most exacting and accomplished watercolor painters, and even today, watercolors—with their unique ability to summarize, clarify, and idealize in full color—are used to illustrate scientific and museum publications. Wildlife illustration reached its peak in the 19th century with artists such as John James Audubon, and today many naturalist field guides are still illustrated with watercolor paintings.
English school Several factors contributed to the spread of watercolor painting during the 18th century, particularly in England."Yet in the Christian era in Britain, it was not appreciated as an art medium in its own right until the 19th century, when Queen Victoria gave the royal seal of approval that brought it firmly into the purview of the art establishment." Among the elite and aristocratic classes, watercolor painting was one of the incidental adornments of a good education; mapmakers, military officers, and engineers valued it for its usefulness in depicting properties, terrain,"By the 18th century, watercolour was well established as a means of making a topographical view of the landscape." fortifications, field geology, and for illustrating public works or commissioned projects. Watercolor artists were commonly taken on geological or archaeological expeditions, funded by the Society of Dilettanti (founded in 1733), to document discoveries in the Mediterranean, Asia, and the New World. These expeditions stimulated the demand for topographical painters, who churned out memento paintings of famous sites (and sights) along the Grand Tour to Italy that was undertaken by every fashionable young man of the time."While families making the Grand Tour of Europe took along their art tutor, in effect to provide the holiday photographs, professional artists such as Alexander Cozens (1717–1786) and Francis Towne (1740–1816) travelled extensively in Italy. It became part of the English tradition that one went abroad to do watercolour paintings of exotic ruins – except that they were known as watercolour drawings, as the medium was not even dignified by the recognition that it was paint".