MITRA Forum Question Details

​Thanks Matthew   It's not just in the whites though; it's the entire paint line. Their description of the vehicle is as follows "Combinations of pure, high quality plant oils produce good adhesion, optimum absorption of the pigment and less tendency to yellow". I have a very sensitive nose and cannot smell linseed oil in these paints. They are virtually odourless--like other paints I have that are made with safflower oil. My guess would be safflower oil is the main vehicle but who knows? They are a professional paint line; in fact they use the word Professional in the paint name. By the way, what do you think of their use of the Blue Wool Scale? Can I trust the lightfastness ratings of these paints provided by the manufacturer? 

​​Presumably, you are talking about Schmincke Mussini. I've had some correspondence with them in the past; they don't disclose their recipes for specific colors, but across the range they do use linseed, safflower, sunflower, and poppy, with linseed being the primary oil that is present in some amount in most colors (with the exception of the whites). They almost certainly use driers; their titanium white dries in about four days in thin layers, and titanium bound in safflower or poppy oil simply does not dry that quickly without some help. 

As Matthew says, driers added in precise amounts during paint manufacture generally aren't something to worry about (unless you want your paint to stay open longer). I've been using Mussini paint for about fifteen years, and have never encountered any issues with darkening. Their titanium white (which as I mentioned, almost certainly contains driers) is tied for first place as "brightest, least yellowing white" on my eight-year old white test sheet. (Blockx titanium white in poppy oil is the other one, but the Blockx white takes twice as long to dry in thin layers, and can remain wet for more than a month in impastos.)

​Thanks but no, actually, I'm not talking about Schmincke Mussini. As far as I know they (Schmincke) are fairly open about the vehicle used in that particular paint, which has been around for a very long time and gets excellent reviews on artists' forums. The paint I am in fact talking about was formulated more recently by Schmincke. It is called "Norma Professional". Norma Professional does not have a considerable degree of linseed oil. I suspect it contains no or very little linseed oil. I find it strange that they are open about the vehicle used in one paint and opaque about that used in the Norma range. 

​Further to my previous comment just posted (I see I can't edit) I jwanted to add that i am relieved to hear that, in general, I don't need to be overly concerned about the use of driers in oils made by reputable companies--so thanks for that. I do like the Schmincke Norma paint and their pigment choice is what I would hope for in a professional paint line but I am still puzzled as to why Schmincke would be using the blue wool scale for lightfastness and I'm wondering whether such ratings are sound? 

​I see we cross posted so please ignore my last query. 

Thanks Brian. This is very useful. I would never expect a manufacturer to give me exact ratios etc but I think identifying the oils used is only reasonable--as well as some assurance that some thought has been given to the possibility of driers (or oils themselves) causing potential long term problems-- and that steps have been taken to minimise these potential problems to a reasonable degree. Instead, what I got from the Schmincke technical expert I emailed was repetitive directions to read the product literature regarding lightfastness--talk about confusing the issue !  Perhaps there was a language problem. In regard to your last statement did you mean long term "drying" defects or "dry" defects ( in relation to safflower oil as a vehicle)?. 

​Thanks again, Matthew and Brian. I've emailed my Schmincke contact again requesting further information but I suspect I will once again be redirected to the company spiel on lightfastness. If so, I may ask a German friend to compose a further email, just in case the problem is one of interpretation due to language difficulties. 

​in case anyone is interested, I've received information as to the oils used in the Schmincke Norma Professional Oil paints. They are linseed, safflower and sunflower oils. I was told this by the tech person at Schmincke who I've been emailing. He informed me that the darker colours contain relatively more linseed oil and the lighter colours relatively less. Personally I can't smell a lot of linseed oil in my 2 darker colours--indanthrene blue and a dark alizarin substitute colour. He also assured me that if used thinly, in a classical painting style, there won't be any "drying defects" . Furthermore he insists that any potential darkening or other colour changes caused by any component of the paint would show up in their lightfastness tests, and so far none have. My new concern is efflorescence but I'll start another post for that.