Colors and color mixing methods of traditional Chinese painting

Colors and color mixing methods of traditional Chinese painting

Color mixing refers to changing a specific tone to form another tone picture with a different feeling. Below I have sorted out the colors and color mixing methods of Chinese painting, I hope it will be helpful to everyone!

1. Color mixing method in the brush

Dip two or three colors in one stroke, and use it as a brush When it falls on the paper, it can produce a coherent color effect. The main purpose is to avoid turbid colors with low saturation due to the mixing of the three primary colors; for example, young leaves are often dipped in two contrasting colors at the same time to create a delicate feeling.

2. Color mixing method in a dish

Before coloring, mix the paint with a pen on the color palette, mix the paint before painting, so that the effect of the painting will be Uniform or gradual changes.

3. Color mixing method in paper

Colors used in traditional Chinese painting

Silver vermilion: dark pink.

Rouge: dark red in color. Pigments made from three kinds of plants: red and blue flowers, madder, and purple stems, will fade over time.

Cinnabar: color vermilion. Used to draw flowers and bird feathers.

Zhu Bi: orange-red in color. The brightness is higher than cinnabar, and the chroma is lower than cinnabar. Used to draw flowers.

Ochre: reddish brown in color. Used to draw rocks, tree trunks, old branches and leaves.

Azurite: Blue in color, divided into first green, second green, and third blue according to the depth. Used to draw leaves or rocks.

Stone green: divided into first green, second green and third green according to the depth. Used to draw rocks, tree trunks, leaves, moss, etc.

White powder: also known as clam powder, white in color, there are two types: clam powder and lead powder. Used to paint white flowers and birds, or mixed with other pigments.

Chuaqing: Color is navy blue. Used to draw branches and leaves, rocks, water waves, etc. Indigo is made from the leaves of polygonum or indigo, and then the cyan pigment is extracted, which is blue-green or navy blue. It has a wide range of uses and can adjust garcinia to grass green or tender green. Broad flowers, pigments. That is cyanine produced in Guangdong. (Contains slightly red components, so the green produced after blending with yellow is relatively calm)

Garcinia: bright yellow in color. Used to draw flowers, branches and leaves. Garcinia: bright yellow. The sea vine tree in the tropical forests of the south is an evergreen tree with a stem as high as twenty meters. Holes are drilled into its bark and yellow resin flows out, which is collected in bamboo tubes. When dried, it can be used as a pigment for traditional Chinese paintings. (It also contains trace amounts of red components, which are toxic. It is very eye-catching when combined with black, and is mostly a danger warning color)

Ochre: dark brown mineral, used as a pigment

Orpiment: mineral name. The ingredient is arsenic trisulfide (As2S3), which is orange-yellow and translucent and can be used to make pigments. The ancients used orpiment to modify words, so they called the random modification of words and random comments as "orpiment", and they called it "orpiment" to ignore the facts and talk casually.

Realgar: Chinese medicinal name. It is an ore containing arsenic sulfide. Also known as Shihuang and Huangshi.

Shihuang: Chinese painting pigment, that is, realgar.

Magenta: orange-red color. Used to draw flowers.

Expansion: Traditional Chinese Painting Colors

At present, the Chinese painting colors sold on the Chinese market mainly include three types of raw materials: minerals, plant substances and chemical synthesis; from packaging The upper part mainly comes in three forms: liquid (packed in tin tubes), powder (packed in bags and bottles), and block (packed together).

(1) Water-based colors in tin tubes

Since the advent of the freehand style of ink painting, the tools and materials of Chinese painting have gradually become simpler, especially in terms of color and ink. In order to be convenient and quick, liquid color liquids in tin tubes and inks in bottles have become popular. The tin tube colors currently on the market mainly include twelve-color Chinese painting colors, which use a variety of raw materials, including traditional minerals, plant substances, and modern chemically synthesized colors. Although this kind of aqueous Chinese painting color is easy to use, the quality of the color is difficult to guarantee, especially for some substandard products, the proportion of color and glue is uneven. After opening, all the glue squeezed out is turbid, and when the color is squeezed out, it is all dregs. , difficult to use. Therefore, when using tin tubes to store colors, use your fingers to squeeze the tin tube back and forth before opening it to allow the glue and color to mix inside, so that there will be no glue-color separation in the extruded color after opening. When using tin tubes to pack colors, be sure to use them freshly and use them up as soon as possible, otherwise they will easily clump after drying and can no longer be used.

(2) Powdered colors

Powdered colors are generally made directly from raw materials, with less use of chemical compounds. They pay attention to the selection of materials, fine production, and color Good quality, high color saturation. Powdered colors are mainly made from various ores, shells, metals, etc., and are basically mineral pigments. In addition, after burning wood charcoal, silk and other materials, the ashes are ground and processed into black powdery pigments with different gray levels. This color is easy to produce a plush feeling when used on the picture. You can use it to draw bees, butterflies, birds, chicks, cats and dogs and other small animals, which can show a special texture effect.

(3) Block color

Block color is actually the deep processing of powder color. Powdered color is a glue-free semi-finished product. Glue must be added when using it, while block color is a color that has already been added with glue. When using it, you only need to soak it with clean water before dipping it in color and painting.

Block colors are not like powdery colors. They are mainly mineral pigments. They contain both mineral pigments and plant pigments, especially plant colors.

The mixing of Chinese painting pigments is very particular. This is because glue is the medium that directly binds the color to the picture. If the glue is used too little, the color will fade easily. If the glue is used too much, the brightness and saturation of the color will be reduced. , only when it is just right can the unique charm of Chinese painting colors be fully exerted. There are two main types of glue used for Chinese painting pigments: peach glue and bone glue. Peach gum is the liquid exuded from peach tree wounds. This liquid has a certain viscosity and condenses into translucent crystals after drying. You can pick peach gum by yourself from the peach grove in spring, or you can buy it on the market; bone glue is made from the glue and fat parts of animal bones and is in the form of granular or strip-shaped translucent crystals. Due to the different raw materials, there are different varieties such as beef glue, deer glue and general pig bone glue. Peach glue is not as sticky as bone glue, so it is not suitable for binding mineral pigments. Bone glue is highly sticky, so both mineral and plant pigments can be used. However, bone glue is easy to deteriorate, especially in hot summer, it must be used freshly. If it takes a long time, it will become rancid and smelly. Among Chinese painting pigments, those that require glue are mainly powdered pigments. There are two main methods for adding glue to powdered pigments: one is the direct mixing method with glue, and the other is the dry powder adhesion method.

(A) Direct glue mixing method

Pour the powdered color into the color palette, mix the glue directly into the toner, and knead it with your fingers until it has a certain degree of toughness. The color group is reserved for later use (if you use a small amount, you only need to use a pen dipped in glue to knead the color powder). When using, add a little warm water to mix the color to the required consistency. If the prepared color cannot be used up at one time, the glue must be removed, otherwise the brightness and saturation of the color will be affected. The so-called degumming is to use clean water to dilute the glued pigment, wait for it to settle and then pour out the clear water on the color, so that the glue will be poured out.

(B) Dry powder adhesion method

This is a method of applying glue directly on the screen. When coloring, apply glue evenly on the picture where you want to fill it, then use a small color sieve (similar to the sieve used to filter out the residue in a Chinese medicine pharmacy) to evenly sprinkle the color powder on the picture, and then use a clean Gently sweep the background pen back and forth a few times, so that the toner will adhere firmly to the picture. This kind of adhesion method does not require direct mixing of color and glue, so it can maintain the original color and luster of the color to the maximum extent and give full play to the expressive power of the color.

Even if the mineral color is added with glue, its adhesion to the picture is still not enough, and the background color will often be brought up when it is repeatedly covered and blended. To make the color adhere firmly to the picture, you can use the glue covering method to solve the problem.

Mineral colors have strong covering power. When used, multiple layers of light colors are generally used, and the method of repeated cover dyeing is used. In this way, the dyed color is thick and calm, with high saturation, and is less prone to water stains and other phenomena. The alum covering method is to lightly brush the mineral color with alum water. After the alum water dries, a protective film is formed to firmly fix the color on the picture. In this way, no matter how many times you apply the color Cover dyeing will not bring up the base color. Note: The glue liquid covering the color should be light and not too thick. If the concentration is too high, a layer of white frost will form on the color after drying, which will not only destroy the picture and reduce the brightness of the color, but it is also irreparable. The method of using alum liquid to cover the color has been known since ancient times, and is called the "three alum and nine dyeing" method.

Although today, when ink-and-wash freehand brushwork is popular, colors are used less and less in paintings, but in meticulous flower-and-bird paintings and folk paintings, color has always been in an irreplaceable position. Especially in the past two decades, the rise of meticulous and modern flower-and-bird paintings has made people more and more aware of the important role of color, and everyone is trying their best to find and explore it. Just when we are suffering from the scarcity of color varieties and single color forms, our neighboring country Japan's paintings are becoming more and more colorful, and people invariably turn their attention to the pigments of Japanese paintings.

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