Titanium white

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Arthur Dove, Silver Sun, 1929. The painting is an early documented instance of titanium white's use. Arthur Dove Silver Sun.jpg
Arthur Dove, Silver Sun, 1929. The painting is an early documented instance of titanium white's use.

Titanium white is a family of white pigments composed primarily of titanium dioxide. [1] It is the most widely used white pigment in contemporary artistic applications because of its affordability, low toxicity, and high hiding power. Though the term titanium white most often refers to pigments containing titanium dioxide, it can also describe any white pigment that contains a titanium compound (e.g. zinc titanate, barium titanate, potassium titanate, titanium lithopone, titanium silicate). [1] :295

Contents

History

The pigment was developed in the 1910s by the Titanium Pigment Company in the United States and the Titan Company in Norway, each working independently. The two manufactures cross-licensed their patents in 1920. [1] :297 By the late 1920s, titanium and zinc white had unseated lead white as the dominant product in the market for white pigment. [2] Most art supply companies now explicitly advise that titanium white should be used instead of lead white for safety reasons. [3]

Visual characteristics

Titianium white provides greater hiding power and tinting strength than any other white pigment. [1] Titanium white was initially more expensive to produce than lead white, but its superior hiding power soon made it a more economical choice because smaller quantities were required to achieve the same degree of opacity. [1] :309

Notable occurrences

Titanium white featured regularly in the palette of Arthur Dove, who was among its earliest adopters in the 1920s. [4] It has also been identified in the work of Thomas Hart Benton, [5] Diego Rivera, [6] Pablo Picasso, [7] and Jackson Pollock. [8]

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Paul Jackson Pollock was an American painter and a major figure in the abstract expressionist movement. He was widely noticed for his "drip technique" of pouring or splashing liquid household paint onto a horizontal surface, enabling him to view and paint his canvases from all angles. It was called all-over painting and action painting, since he covered the entire canvas and used the force of his whole body to paint, often in a frenetic dancing style. This extreme form of abstraction divided the critics: some praised the immediacy of the creation, while others derided the random effects. In 2016, Pollock's painting titled Number 17A was reported to have fetched US$200 million in a private purchase.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Titanium</span> Chemical element, symbol Ti and atomic number 22

Titanium is a chemical element with the symbol Ti and atomic number 22. Found in nature only as an oxide, it can be reduced to produce a lustrous transition metal with a silver color, low density, and high strength, resistant to corrosion in sea water, aqua regia, and chlorine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pigment</span> Colored material

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Titanium dioxide</span> Chemical compound often used as a white pigment, Including in food and paints.

Titanium dioxide, also known as titanium(IV) oxide or titania, is the inorganic compound with the chemical formula TiO
2
. When used as a pigment, it is called titanium white, Pigment White 6 (PW6), or CI 77891. It is a white solid that is insoluble in water, although mineral forms can appear black. As a pigment, it has a wide range of applications, including paint, sunscreen, and food coloring. When used as a food coloring, it has E number E171. World production in 2014 exceeded 9 million tonnes. It has been estimated that titanium dioxide is used in two-thirds of all pigments, and pigments based on the oxide have been valued at a price of $13.2 billion.

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Zinc white is an inorganic pigment composed of zinc oxide that has been used by painters since the late eighteenth century. Alongside lead and titanium white, it is among the three most prominent white pigments that are commercially available today. Its primary advantages are its low toxicity and the cool clarity of its color. It was initially developed in the 1780s by the French chemist and magistrate Louis-Bernard Guyton de Morveau, who struggled to popularize its use. The French Academy of Sciences approved of the invention in 1782, but artists from the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture expressed skepticism. Initially, zinc white pigment was more costly to produce than lead white, but its price diminished as production methods improved over the course of the nineteenth century. While the superior safety of zinc white had been established by the end of the eighteenth century, manufacturers of lead white downplayed these differences, and lead continued to dominate the market for white paint until the early twentieth century.

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Barium borate is an inorganic compound, a borate of barium with a chemical formula BaB2O4 or Ba(BO2)2. It is available as a hydrate or dehydrated form, as white powder or colorless crystals. The crystals exist in the high-temperature α phase and low-temperature β phase, abbreviated as BBO; both phases are birefringent, and BBO is a common nonlinear optical material.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sachtleben Chemie</span>

Sachtleben Chemie is a chemicals producer, with its primary focus on the production of white pigments, fillers and extenders. The company employs some 2,200 persons and achieves annual sales of around 820 million euros (2012). Sachtleben has been a member of the multinational Venator group since 2017. The company's corporate history reaches back over 130 years. Sachtleben produces particles using titanium dioxide, zinc sulfide and barium sulfate as the chemical basis, and markets these products worldwide. The principal applications for Sachtleben products include man-made fibers, paints and other coatings, plastics, and paper. Sachtleben also supplies special particles to the foodstuffs, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics industries, and has interests in the fields of chromatography, nanotechnology, catalysis, and the production of building materials. The company leads the world in special titanium dioxide grades for printing inks and for the cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and food industries. The production facilities at all three locations apply the sophisticated sulfate-route process.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ground (art)</span> Term in art

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References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Laver, Marilyn (1997). "Titanium Dioxide Whites". In Fitzhugh, Elisabeth West (ed.). Artists' Pigments: A Handbook of Their History and Characteristics. Vol. 3. Archetype. pp. 295–355.
  2. Markowitz, Gerald; Rosner, David (1987). Deceit and Denial: The Deadly Politics of Industrial Pollution. University of California Press. p. 54.
  3. Finlay, Victoria (2002). Color: A Natural History of the Palette. Random House. p. 111.
  4. Wimsatt, J. (1982). "Wax Emulsion, Tempera or Oil? Arthur Dove's Materials, Techniques, and Surface Effect". American Institute for Conservation: Preprints: 183–88.
  5. Branchick, T.; Braun, E. (1985). "The Restoration of 'America Today'". Thomas Hart Benton: The 'America Today' Murals. Williams College Museum of Art. pp. 66–82.
  6. Heller, B. (1988). "The Conservation of Diego Rivera's Detroit Industry Fresco Cycle". American Institute for Conservation: Preprints: 85–98.
  7. Coupry, C. (1987). "Analyses de pigments blancs appliquées à I'étude chronologique des peintures de chevalet-blanc de titane". www.icom-cc-publications-online.org. Retrieved 2022-12-31.
  8. Gabrieli, Francesca; Rosi, Francesca; Vichi, Alessandra; Cartechini, Laura; Pensabene Buemi, Luciano; Kazarian, Sergei G.; Miliani, Costanza (2017). "Revealing the Nature and Distribution of Metal Carboxylates in Jackson Pollock's Alchemy (1947) by Micro-Attenuated Total Reflection FT-IR Spectroscopic Imaging". Analytical Chemistry. 89 (2): 1283–1289. doi:10.1021/acs.analchem.6b04065. ISSN   0003-2700. PMID   28035811.