Art materials & technical art history
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A guide to the pigment Colour Index™: history and practical insights
by Ioana Maria Cortea — Published on April 20, 2026 — Reading time: 8 min If you’ve ever turned over a paint tube and noticed a small code like PR108, you’ve already encountered the Pigment Colour Index™ (CI)—a system designed to identify what a pigment actually is, beyond its commercial name. The Colour Index™ is the result of over… read more
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INFRA-ART spectral data collections: precious, poisonous, rare, and other hard-to-find pigments
by Ioana Maria Cortea — Published on March 22, 2026 — Reading time: 10 min Part of the INFRA-ART Spectral Data Collections article series The use of pigments has been fundamental to artistic creation throughout history. From the earliest cave paintings to contemporary practices, artists have continuously sought to expand their visual language by experimenting with both natural and… read more
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INFRA-ART spectral data collections: watercolors
by Ioana Maria Cortea — Published on October 22, 2025 · Updated on February 11, 2026 — Reading time: 10 min Part of the INFRA-ART Spectral Data Collections article series Watercolor is among the most familiar and widely practiced painting media, yet its material behavior is uniquely complex — highly responsive to light, moisture, paper chemistry,… read more
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A brief history of watercolors. Part II: Materials and techniques
by Lucian Cristian Ratoiu — Published on October 9, 2025 — Reading time: 18 min This article explores the material evolution of watercolor and how technical innovation shaped its artistic development. Beginning with William Reeves’s late-eighteenth-century color cakes and continuing through Winsor & Newton’s nineteenth-century pans and tubes, it traces the transition from hand-ground pigments to… read more
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A brief history of watercolors. Part I: From technical experiment to fine art tradition
by Lucian Cristian Ratoiu — Published on September 24, 2025 — Reading time: 16 min This article traces the historical development of watercolor painting from its earliest material formulations in East Asia to its refinement and institutional recognition in Europe and beyond. It examines the technical evolution of the medium—its reliance on transparency, pigment chemistry, and… read more
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INFRA-ART spectral data collections: earth pigments
by Ioana Maria Cortea — Published on September 2, 2025 — Reading time: 20 min Part of the INFRA-ART Spectral Data Collections article series Earth pigments are among the oldest materials used in human artistic expression. These naturally occurring pigments, derived from iron oxides, manganese compounds, clays, and other minerals, have been used since the earliest… read more