Working with titanium white

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

One of the two types of white most commonly used in modern painting is titanium white. They are superior in some of their qualities to other popular types - lead and zinc.

Backstory: Lead

White paint has been used by artists since ancient times. As early as the first century BC, the Roman historian Pliny described the process of creating white from lead filings using vinegar. Subsequently, each major European country developed its own technology for the production of white lead. They were widely used in painting, icon painting, for technical needs. However, lead is an extremely toxic material. The harm caused by white lead to professional artists and builders, as well as to the poor who made them, cannot be calculated.

Zinc

There were alternative dyes - bone white, made from the bones of lambs, white from chalk, eggshells and even pearls. But all of them were extremely rare, difficult to manufacture, and therefore expensive. Because of this, artists continued to use poisonous lead. The more common types - kaolin, antimony, sulfur, lead-tin - still do notreached the volume of white lead production.

This continued until 1780, when two French chemists, Bernard Courtois and Louis Bernard Guitone de Morveau, set out to find a less dangerous paint. Their choice fell on zinc oxide, on the basis of which low-toxic white was obtained. The problem was their price. Zinc white was four times more expensive than lead, so many artists remained faithful to the old material.

Titanium

At the end of the 18th century, the Englishman William Gregor and the German Klaproth discovered a previously unknown metal, which later replaced lead in the mass production of whitewash. But until the beginning of the 20th century, titanium was considered a useless, good-for-nothing metal. Only in 1908, European chemists found a use for it - titanium dioxide began to be used in the production of a new type of white. Beginning in 1920, mass production of titanium white was launched in Europe, almost completely replacing lead white from the market. The innovation reached Russia only by the thirties of the last century. Thanks to this fact, researchers manage to distinguish genuine works of the beginning of the century from falsifications: negligent copyists do not take into account that Russian avant-garde artists wrote mainly with the use of lead white, which was later replaced by titanium white.

Comparison of different types of whitewash

• Toxicity. Lead white is extremely toxic and is currently used exclusively in artistic paints. The International Occupational Safety and He alth Association bans painting residential walls withusing white lead. Male painters under the age of eighteen and women of any age are prohibited from working with lead. Zinc white is slightly toxic, does not pose a threat to life, and titanium white can be written without any harm to he alth.
• Covering power (hiding power). Zinc white has the lowest hiding power, due to which they are successfully used in classical painting with glazing. It is impractical to make glazing with titanium white, since their hiding power is much higher (2, 7). But they are perfect for denser painting a la prima - this pigment covers other colors well.
• Shade. Zinc white has a slightly warm tone, titanium white has a cold tone.
• Resilience. Zinc white, especially with a large thickness of the paint layer, cracks over time. This does not happen with titanium white - one of their varieties is so strong that it is used to paint spaceships. White lead is also very durable - it is to them that the work of the old masters owes its safety.

Other Features of Titanium White

Over time, work written with titanium white may acquire a bluish tint. In oil painting, these whites should be used with caution. They are not recommended to be mixed with some other paints: azure, cob alt, cadmium. When mixed with them, a bleaching effect may occur, and fragile ink compounds are formed. Titanium white will turn yellow over time. Titanium dioxide atmixed with organic pigments may fade over time. It is not recommended to cover the work using titanium white with oil copal varnish - darkening is inevitable.

Because of all these shortcomings in the middle of the twentieth century, artists refused to use titanium white. Their production has been suspended. But other titanium whites - acrylic, gouache or tempera - were produced at the same pace. They continued to be used with success by many painters. Titanium oil white also did not last long in oblivion - their high hiding power, non-toxicity and relative cheapness returned them to the shelves, and today everyone can practically determine whether their use is acceptable for him.