Linseed Oil Sampler

The use of oleoresinous mediums in oil painting can sometimes overly complicate the paint film and lead to disastrous, if not unexpected, results. Rublev Colours offers alternatives to oleoresinous mediums for painting by offering a sampler of four linseed oil products (2 fluid ounces each) to amend oil colors and to prepare emulsions in tempera. Included in the linseed oil sampler are:

Linseed Oil

Aged Refined Oil is a low-acid-value linseed oil, perfect for diluting mediums, thinning oil colors, and making your own oil paint. However, it also has many other uses besides making paint, as one artist recently discovered: he exposed it to sunlight to thicken it into a light-bodied oil. What this did was make an oil that, when mixed with oil colors, produced wash-like glazes that looked almost like watercolor without being smeary or uneven. The oil dried to a very solid film within 1-1/2 days.

Pale Drying Oil is fast drying linseed oil. Add to oil colors to speed drying without the danger of adding excessive amounts of driers. Add small amounts—up to 30%—to oil colors to promote faster drying. This is a good substitute for fast-drying oil painting mediums. Contains a scientifically controlled amount of driers.

Bodied Oil is a heat-treated and polymerized (thickened) linseed oil. It is made from well-refined linseed oil cooked in an inert atmosphere. Bodied oils have moderate acid value, better color, and yellow less than typical ‘stand oils’ obtained by conventional open-kettle cooking and unbodied oils. It provides gloss, flow-out, and leveling, as well as non-yellowing characteristics, compared to other stand- or sun-thickened oils. Bodied oils form harder films than raw or refined linseed oil.

Epoxide Oil is a copolymerized linseed oil that is fast-drying and offers good chemical and water resistance. Copolymerized linseed oil provides a new vehicle for oil painting that behaves like a drying oil and fast-drying resin. The difference is truly astonishing. Use it in place of natural and synthetic oleoresinous mediums to speed up drying and improve film formation.

Health and Safety

Warning: Rags or paper towels contaminated with vegetable drying oils, particularly those containing iron oxide pigments are susceptible to spontaneous combustion. To prevent unexpected fires, used rags or paper towels contaminated with oil-based materials should be collected in a closeable, air-tight container. Store water-dampened rags or paper towels in a metal container with an air-tight top. Alternatively, washing contaminated rags will remove contaminants and eliminate the risk.