How to Make Egg Tempera Paints

The Materials and Techniques for Making Egg-Yolk-Based Paints

Aug 23, 2008

Egg tempera, one of the oldest, most permanent and strikingly beautiful painting mediums, uses the yolk of an egg as its binder and is surprisingly easy to make.

Egg tempera paint is simple to make but has produced some of the greatest masterpieces of painting in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and as is still the paint of choice of a significant number of modern painters. It takes few materials, most of which are readily available from any art supply store and some even from your local grocery store.

The Basics of Egg Tempera Paints

At its simplest, egg tempera paint consists of colored powders (pigments) mixed with water to make a paste which is then "tempered" (altered) with the fresh, fluid yolk of an egg which binds the dried paint together. Sable and sometimes stiff-haired brushes are used to apply this tempered paint mixture in multiple layer to smooth-surfaced painting panels.

Egg tempera paints dry primarily by evaporation, as with most water-based paints. However, there is a slower process called denaturing that the paint goes through, first over a period of some weeks, after which the paint become water resistant and then finally over a period of years as it becomes very hard, tough and virtually insoluble.

Preparing Egg Tempera Pigment Paste

Egg tempera paint is prepared in three stages. First, powdered artist grade pigments are mixed with distilled water on a glass plate or "slab" using a muller or in a pestle using a mortar.

The muller is a usually made of glass. The upper part is shaped so it can be easily held in the hand while the bottom has been ground to a flat, slightly rough surface which actually grinds the pigment paste. This tool traditionally is moved repeatedly with moderate pressure in a figure-eight pattern on the slab over pigment which has been mixed with a small amount of distilled water to make a soft paste.

The pestle is a small glass or ceramic bowl, often sitting on a pedestal base. The mortar is a blunt-ended hand tool, usually of glass or ceramic, used to grind the pigment and water paste.

With both the mortar and pestle and muller and slab, the object is to grind the pigment/water paste to an even smooth consistency, eliminating any lumps and dry areas in the paste.

Preparing Egg Tempera Egg Yolk Binder

Once the pigments have been ground smooth, the egg yolk binder is then prepared.

First, the egg shell is broken and the egg white is carefully poured out while retaining the yolk in one half of the shell. Then, the yolk is carefully rolled out onto the palm of the hand, being carefully not to break the skin around the yolk.

The intact yolk is then passed from palm to palm with a rolling motion to remove most of the egg white still clinging to the yolk. Usually the artist will wipe each empty palm on a fresh, clean, dry cloth before rolling the egg back onto it from the other palm.

The egg yolk is then punctured with a sharp tool, and the liquid inside is allowed to pour into a clean, shallow container. Finally the skin of the yolk is squeezed gently to force out any fluid still inside.

Keeping Your Egg Tempera Paint and Equipment Clean

During the Renaissance, egg tempera was nicknamed the "pinta putrida," meaning the putrid or rotten paint. Since the ingredients of the medium are all natural -- organic egg yolk and various natural glues, usually rabbit hide glue -- they tend to spoil easily.

The egg yolk binder should be made fresh everyday. Some painters even add a small amount of natural preservative such as vinegar to the pigment/water paste. Most painters who keep these pastes for more than a day refrigerate them between painting sessions. Other painters believe that any form of preservative interferes with the permanency of the final painting. These painters usually make their pigment pastes fresh every day.

All of your materials, equipment and tools should be kept as clean and as close to sterile as possible. However, keep in mind that egg tempera paintings from many hundreds of year ago are still clean and beautiful today despite their painters' lack of understanding of bacteria and funguses, so don't obsess about sterility.

Using Your Finished Egg Tempera Paints

Once your paints are made, then you are ready to paint an egg tempera painting. For instruction, read the article "Painting With Egg Tempera."

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The copyright of the article How to Make Egg Tempera Paints in Painting/Drawing is owned by George Stephen Murray. Permission to republish How to Make Egg Tempera Paints in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.