Reds and pinks

Red, though little energizing, is, according to some, the colour perceived the fastest, even at a distance. It is found quite everywhere across the world in engagement or marital celebrations, saturnalia, Eastern or Western fleshpots, etc. It is the colour of Bacchus and Dionysos. Even from a linguistic point of view, red is interesting : it is called royro in Japan, holi in India, rouge or rouille in France and, doubtlessly, lots of other terms phonetically similar throughout the world.

We will mention also the association between red and menstruations: The occasion, for some peoples to revere feminity through this colour, and for some others to point, by the compulsory wearing of the red colour on the face, a so-called impure condition, informing at the same time the other civilizations about their own obscurantism.

We note fortunately though, a traditional use of red globally protective and propitiatory in the battle as in love, sometimes even repelling Evil spirits, emphasizing a political rank or an authority and protecting the cattle- apart from the supposed curative virtues of hematite and dragon's blood to fight measles and such or such other inflammation -, in numerous traditions worldwide. These traditions, referring often to red ochre, could be so old that historically they could be combined with the first act of painting.

Summary

Colours mentioned in other articles

ancient pink or rosette (red brazil, braziline)

The achiote(glossary)

reds of local use

Important : see also

They are generally superb, dazzling, bright and have a very correct permanence. Very colouring, they are not very covering.

Many imitations of pigments that went rare or are considered as hazardous are azoic.

Its base is toluidine, possibly blended with xylidine (azoic). It is very colouring, intense and bright but fairly permanent.

Imitations made nowadays with the same base as helios red. It is clearly more pink than red. For more details, read the passage in vermilions.

It is derived from the same plant (synantherous family) than the oil of the same name - North American - but not exactly from the same variety. Eastern species are renowned - this pigment would be used a lot in Chinese paints - but the Alsatian and Provençal acclimatizations do not have a bad rap.

To tell the truth, we are lacking information about the colour of the pigment itself. Thanks for telling us more about this product, its fabrication, its uses, its conservation.

Lead chromate + lead oxide, you guessed right : Adrianople red is a toxic pigment and has almost disappeared. Its current composition is exactly the same as the ongoing version of the late orange-coloured chrome yellow. Actually, the term Adrianople"red" corresponds an to old linguistic blank. Today it would be rather classified among orange colours.

Its manufacturing process - quite special - was a major commercial secret, discovered during the Middle-Age. Rancid fat, oil, urine and excrement, animal blood : the fabrication was particularly appalling !

The term scarlet, maybe from the Persian saqirlat, cloth) is sometimes affixed to a common heading like "cadmium red". Sometimes it is only a change resulting from a mere yellowing of the original colour (ex.: addition of PY83, of an azo).

The etymology of the word indicates a considerable linguistic journey during which the original meaning - a blue, apparently- has been altered. Today, we basically number among the"scarlet"colours: vermilion, some cadmium red light and japanese red light, all of them tending to orange. Globally, they are the most dazzling red colours.

Gobelins and Venetian scarlet are mentioned in dyeing. They are maybe cooler than those we acknowledge today under this appellation.

Besides, is the term "red garnet"correct? Is it a red ? Only theoretically, because there are black garnets and the paint manufacturers offer some "red garnet" that are strongly purplish !

For etymologic reasons, this subject is discussed in the article dedicated to cool blue, following the indigo, indican and indanthrene sections.

First, it is a big shrub (Lawsonia inermis, family Lythraceae) growing in India, Middle East and Maghreb. The colouring substance is extracted from the leaves: simply dried then finely powedered before being blended with slightly acidic water (lemon) and boiled not longer than an hour.

It has a strong affinity with human skin (but also with nails and hair) : it colours the skin very easily, and it is even supposed to have healing and fungicidal virtues (information not confirmed). Sometimes used to tint a too white skin (like Fatima's, the Prophet's daughter, according to the religious tradition; or newborn's skin according to some customary traditions), for some muslim peoples it has divine virtues (although not asserted by the Coran). It is then traditionnally, supposed to protect from the spirits in very diverse circumstances. It is often applied on the palms, the sole of the foot, the nails and lips.

Its colour, which is well-known, is red brown, becoming clearly yellow when diluted.

Pink. a colour so difficult to define because it is so delicate. It tends very easily to the kitsch, and is so arduous to handle!

* The most "common" (generally), which is a red built up with white. This is the case for the colours improperly called "flesh tones" and "flesh ochres" by the manufacturers (see complexions). This kind of binary blend (it is a mix of burnt Sienna and zinc or titanium white) is recognizable by far. Not very convenient for glazing because it is very covering, it is very often to be... frankly avoided.
Some pink that are more elaborate, more broken, like for example "old rose", are built from two colours or more and a white. They can be very adapted to abstract or figurative uses, but hardly or more locally to the portrait specifically, unless they are meddled, intimately juxtaposed, again and again.

* the pinks born from a very transparent red applied as a glaze on a light background, have a strength, a powerful intensity. Even though the chromatic result may be touching, there again, breaking the tone (the red or the background colour) is often necessary.

Pink is associated to erotism and as it is often the case in this domain, there is a high risk of lapsing into vulgarity and even more of going for the easy option. This colour needs certainly the best-trained, the most subtle eye. Going for provocation is also a solution. But this track has been explored, adapted, sung and howled in all possible manners.

In summary, pink is a challenge : this colour is not the colour of the skin (in general), but it symbolized it so strongly that it is very difficult to live down the symbol, related (according to some) to the age when the white of the innocence succeeds in marrying the heat of the red. Its best use is probably the furthermost, by the context, of this reference.

Poorly permanent in presence of light, toxic. Impossible to use in oil painting.

According to an information not confirmed, it would be obtained by precipitation of an antimony chloride solution with another solution: hyposulfite of soda. A process in which we do not see neither arsenic nor cobalt! Obviously, either the information is false, or it is way too partial, or it is an imitation. Any precise information about cobalt arsenate is welcome.

This pigment would have been used a lot in Great Britain during the XIX^th century.

Its colour is supposed to cover a large spectrum from yellow-orange to purplish red.

Still found on the palettes at the end of the XIXth century, this poison is fortunately quite rejected. Read the article of the glossary.

At the time of Medieval illuminations, this pink was made from a wood called brazil. The designation may surprise, since Brazil has been discovered only a lot later; but brazil means wood, by analogy between ember (brasa in Portuguese) and the colour of the pigmentary substance extracted from some woods. Before Christopher Columbus, Europe already disposed of a tree specie usable for the fabrication of the pigment, Caesalpinia sappan. This plant contains a dyeing substance, braziline or brazileine.

The first name of Brazil was Vera Cruz (named in 1500 by Pedro Cabral). This appellation changed very rapidly (XVI^th) into Braxil (pronounce brachi'w, evolving into brazi'w) because people discovered in this land a huge quantity of tree species having tinctorial properties of first importance at that time - actually since the Antiquity - for the world economy and geopolitics.

The fabrication process has been mastered late. The thin chips of this wood (grated with glass and not iron) were put to macerate in wine and/or water meddled with alum, then reheated (sometimes, according to places and recipes: there are cold-processes) in order to supply a pigment usable in paint or for inks, or for dyes. Actually, it was used mostly to dye luxury drapes and princely garments.

This pigment was costly not only because of the difficulty of reducing the chips into powder, but also because its importation followed a very long route.

As a matter of fact, it would have imported in Europe since the end of the XII^th century by the Venetians, from Java, Sri Lanka, Sumatra and India via Bagdad,.

Brasilian species (this time, we are talking about the land), growing on the Atlantic coast, are also Cesalpineae. There are in fact, on the planet, different plants of this family, among which Pernambuco wood and Malay or Filippino sappan.

The water-resistance of red brazil is excellent, but its light-sensibility is pointed by some writers, and that could explain its progressive disappearance in favour of other substances more permanent.

Its shades change from orange to violet function of the chemical charge of the solution where it macerates. It would turn orange in presence of an acidic solution, and violet if the mixture is basic (information not confirmed). Most of the time, the dyer and the artist looked for a pink.

During the XVIII^th century, people still used red brazil to dye the mordants in order to control their presence, the saturation of the fiber, and therefore the ability of a local area of the fabric to keep later a more powerful dye.

As a pigment of vegetable origin, colouring and transparent, red brazil has been sometimes considered as a lacquer (cf. lacquers, ancient lacquers).

Sorghum (China), sorrel and hibiscus are mentioned in some books as well as different African woods, meddled with water or with palm oil.

For historical reasons, the limit between reds and mauves, even violets, is particularly vague. We advise our readers to visit the article Violet and mauve.