The Origins of Oil Painting

Oil painting is in actuality a fairly new art medium. As a painting medium, the use of oil in combination with pigments only dates back to the 1400's. Prior to its invention, painting in general does date back to the Stone Age, but paint was made by using binders other than oil mixed with pigment, such as egg in tempera paints or plaster in frescoes.

In the early fifteenth century in Europe, there came about a certain conquest for reality in art. Art was transitioning from decorative and mythological during a Middle Age to a time of rebirth or revival with the beginning of the Renaissance. Artists were finally beginning to understand the mathematical laws behind perspective and there began an interest to portray more sincere, moving works of art that were visually more realistic. Artists began to use nature as a source of inspiration for their paintings.
Jan Van Eyck (1395-1441) was a painter of the Northern Renaissance who sought to mimic nature in his paintings. In order to do so, Van Eyck became intent on painting every tiniest detail of his subjects in order to make them seem alive. Eventually, Van Eyck realized that in order to carry out his intentions of painting such minute detail to his fullest satisfaction that he needed to improve the technique of painting. He became the inventor of oil painting.

Previously, Van Eyck and all other Renaissance painters and painters before them did not buy ready-made colours. They ground their own pigment from natural sources such as plants and minerals, and added a binder to form a paste with which to paint. Throughout the Middle Ages, the binder was egg and the final product was called tempera paint, which had the tendency to dry very quickly. The quick drying characteristics of tempera paint did not allow for smooth transitions in shading, which was necessary for achieving the sense of reality Van Eyck was attempting to portray. Instead of egg, he used oil in order to work much more slowly and accurately. An oil binder allows making glossy colours, which can be applied in transparent layers or glazes. Van Eyck was also able to apply the tiny detail lines and highlights with a pointed brush. Soon after beginning to work with the newly invented oil painting medium, his work amazed his contemporaries and led a general acceptance of oil painting as the most widely suitable painting medium.

So began oil painting as we know it today. Although oil colours are much more convenient, sold in tube form, and we have many more mixing mediums to choose from than Van Eyck did, we still appreciate the same qualities of oil painting that Van Eyck invented it for.