Glazing (painting technique)

Glazing is a painting technique in which thin, translucent layers of color are applied over dried paint. The underlying layers remain visible, shaping the resulting color and depth.

Optical mixing: The perception of a combined color produced by viewing separate colors together rather than physically mixing them. A glaze and its underpainting can be perceived together while remaining physically distinct.
Pigment: A finely divided colored material that gives paint its hue and opacity or transparency. Pigment properties determine how much light a glaze transmits or absorbs.
Oil painting: A painting medium in which pigments are suspended in drying oil. Oil paint's slow drying and range of transparent pigments make repeated glazing practical.
Jan van Eyck: A fifteenth-century Netherlandish painter known for highly detailed oil paintings. His luminous surfaces are associated with carefully layered oil paint and translucent effects.
Underpainting: An initial layer of paint that establishes composition, values, or color beneath later layers. Glazes modify the appearance of this earlier surface without fully concealing it.
Paint binder: The liquid or film-forming material that holds pigment particles together and attaches them to a surface. The binder gives a glaze its film, handling properties, and degree of transparency.
Portrait painting: The depiction of a person, especially the face and individual likeness, in a visual artwork. Glazing can subtly shift flesh tones and refine transitions without obscuring modeled forms.
Mona Lisa: A portrait painting by Leonardo da Vinci, begun around 1503 and now held by the Louvre. Its softly modeled face illustrates the subtle transitions often associated with layered paint.
Drying oil: A plant-derived oil that hardens through oxidation and is used as a binder in oil paint. Oil-paint glazes rely on a transparent, drying binder to form thin films.
Solvent: A liquid that dissolves or dilutes another material and can evaporate from a paint mixture. Solvents adjust glaze flow and thickness before the paint film sets.

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