We're very inspired by early cave art and naturally occurring pigments. The colours are rich and soft, light-fast, and are soluble in many different mediums such as water, oil, paint, plaster and wax.

We've put together a Cave Art Kit that has four of these colours and charcoal for drawing - this is a good way to try out these pigments.

All the colours can be bought separately as well.

^isaprocart^

Cave Art by Andrew J Lawson. An excellent book with good background information and pictures.

Paperback. Shire Publications, 1991. ISBN: 0-7478-0120-7

***This is currently out of print, so the ones we have here are the last until further notice***

 

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A selection of 4 powdered ochres and earth pigments that are of a type used by the early cave painters (50g each of red ochre, yellow ochre, purple ochre and white china clay), charcoal chunks (made from English willow charcoal) and a red ochre drawing stick.

These ochres are lightfast and permanent, and can also be used in many other ways. We've used red ochre mixed with linseed oil for coating our yurt frame, and we use red ochre mixed with a colourless wood wax for our drum frames.

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Four pots of earth pigments (30ml each of red ochre, yellow ochre, black ochre and white clay) and an information leaflet, all in a re-useable zip-top pack.

These are perhaps the four most commonly used pigments in many indigenous cultures, and give soft, rich, lightfast colours. The powdered pigments can be mixed with many different substances, such as oil, water, wax, gum arabic, rabbit skin glue, dilute PVA or wood glue, egg yolk, varnish, paint, etc.

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We make these drawing sticks by hand here in the workshop, and they're a good way of using the ochres and earth pigments. They're quite powdery in consistency, like a chalk pastel crayon. This means that you can scrape some powder off the stick and mix it with anything of your choice - oil, wax, dilute glue, etc - so that you can use the pigment in projects. You can also use the drawing stick directly of course.

The set comes in a tin and consists of: black ochre, purple ochre, red ochre, yellow ochre and white clay. Each stick is approximately 2" (50mm) long.

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Gum Arabic
£2.00

A natural tree resin that is soluble in water, this is ideal for making a base for natural paint. Just soak the granules in water, and use this as your paint base. It will be also be soluble in water after the paint has dried, so bear this in mind for if your paint needs to be permanent, or needs to be washed off. 50g

To use, put the resin granules in a bowl, pour on boiling water and leave. Stir occasionally and allow to cool. If you want your paint to be less brittle you can add a small amount of honey.

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A natural red ochre powder that comes in a 30ml glass jar. A good rich red that we use in a lot of our craft projects.

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A natural yellow ochre powder. We use this on some of our drum shells and in many of our own projects. The wallpaper for this website was painted using yellow ochre. We'll update the website soon with a photo of the 30ml jar - in the meantime, the photo is of the loose powder.

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It's unusual to find a green earth pigment, but green earth, or terra verde, is found in some parts of Italy and Bavaria. It was used by the Romans to paint the walls of their villas. We'll update the website soon with a photo of the 30ml jar - in the meantime, the photo is of the loose powder.

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Charcoal that is particularly good for drawing, hand-made by charcoal burners from English willow. 50g

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Powdered charcoal made by English charcoal-burners. A less harmful alternative to the manganese black which was used by prehistoric cave painters. 25g.

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