Will It Lift?

It Is Known: phthalos are highly staining. Once you let them dry, they are on the paper forever. Right?

I certainly thought so. But then I decided to try using hot press paper, and to try using it properly, to paint a delicate, multi-layered botanical illustration. The first layer went on very nicely: the smoothness of the paper allowed me to be much more precise than usual. I let it dry for several hours before touching brush to paper again…

And my careful first layer reactivated at once! Even though it was made of basic PHTHALO BLUE GREEN SHADE.

This shocked me, and sent me down a rabbit-hole. Is hot press paper just lifty? Was it the paper brand (Baohong)? Was it the paint brand (Isaro)? Several tedious hours later, I have some answers!

My Experimental Conclusions

Since I dislike it when blog posts make me read through pages of blather, I am adopting the scientific paper approach of giving the readers my conclusions up front. So, here they are:

• Yes, hot press paper is “lifty”. At least, the artist-grade 100% cotton version of it, from both Baohong and Arches. (So it is not Baohong! If anything, I think Arches hot press lifts more easily.)
• Yes, Isaro is an exceptionally non-staining paint. Rosa is too, and maybe Maimeri.
• M Graham is much, much more staining than anything else. Qor and Roman Szmal seem above average in staining, too.
• But (apart from M Graham) the differences were much less dramatic than I had hoped, so people who use the brush with a lighter hand might not even notice the problem.

Now that I have killed off all the suspense, time to describe my experiment!

The Methodology

I decided to perform my tests using phthalo blue green shade, not just because that was the paint that surprised me, but also because it is a very common pigment and I have at least a sample of it in many brands. (Not all the brands, though: for three of the fifteen brands tested, I substituted PB16.)

I also decided to throw in a second paint, Ultramarine Blue, because it is (in my experience) less staining, but still described as staining by many sources. (Such as handprint.com.) I focused on staining paints because I was pretty sure that non-staining paints would lift with boring ease.

I then painted strips of both my chosen paints on four different pieces of paper.

I waited a day. And then. I pulled out my Rosemary and Co eradicator, and got to work!

My basic lifting test consisted of swiping the strip with the (clean, and only slightly damp) eradicator, then dabbing the moist strip with a paper towel. I did four tests per swatch: a quick one swipe/one dab, followed by more intense sessions of ten swipes/one dab, ten swipes/one dab repeated twice, and ten swipes/one dab repeated four times. (Aka until exhaustion.)

Because my swatching/swiping/dabbing technique was not all that consistent, I was glad to have four sheets. It’s a bit like having multiple samples for my brand comparison! Not MANY samples, but still.

The Results

Let us start with the easier pigment: Ultramarine Blue. With enough scrubbing, this lifted completely for many of the brands. I can see significant traces left behind only in Daniel Smith, Sennelier, Da Vinci, and M Graham. Isaro, Michael Harding, Blockx, Holbein, Schmincke… many of the others lift to clear white.

As for the phthalos — hmm. Seems they are staining after all: no paint came up fully! That said, I see some white in Rosa (I have seen reviews suggesting that it is a lifty brand!), Isaro (yes!) and Maimeri. M Graham and Qor are obviously more staining than the others, but Roman Szmal held on pretty well, too.

Here, the Ultramarine lifted even better; completely cleanly, in several brands. The dirtiest are M Graham, Daniel Smith, and Da Vinci. Among the phthalos, M Graham remains the staining champion, with Qor and Roman Szmal a bit behind. Rosa, Isaro, and Maimeri remain the whitest. So there is some consistency!

To my eye, lifting was harder on this paper than on the hot press: the lines near the top of the strips are darker here, showing that more swiping is needed to achieve the same degree of lift. The winners and losers remain the same, however: Daniel Smith, M Graham, Sennelier, and Da Vinci are the most staining, and Schmincke, Holbein, Maimeri, Blockx, Isaro and Michael Harding are the cleanest.

No surprises here! The lifting takes more swipes than on either hot press. M Graham Ultramarine is the dirtiest, and the usual long list is the cleanest. M Graham also has the most tenacious phthalo, followed by Qor and Roman Szmal… and maybe Holbein or WN, which have actually been more-diirty-than-average across all the sheets.

The consistency across all these sheets is heartening! I think it is pretty clear that M Graham is the most staining brand all-round, while Isaro and Rosa and probably Maimeri are more on the lifty side. If you want a brand with a staining phthalo , then Qor and Roman Szmal are also good options, and Daniel Smith, Holbein, and WN look good too.

I am focusing on the phthalo here because it seems plausible that brands with a very staining phthalo might be emphasizing the staining property for other staining paints, so if one is looking for a brand that layers well… Meanwhile, the variance in the ultramarines might be more of a paint design choice? Of course this is just a hypothesis, and one I cannot prove without more extensive tests. But playing with the staining property as part of paint design is definitely a thing: many brands offer a non-staining phthalo blue as a hue for cerulean or manganese.

One thing that surprised me here was how middle-of-the-road Sennelier is! It is often described as a great layering paint, but it does not seem to hold onto the paper all that strongly. Perhaps that description is based more on their paint catalogue? They do not seem to offer many granulating/lifting paints. Or perhaps they design their paints so that the pigments that usually lift (looking at you, cobalts!) are a bit more tenacious? Again, more experiments are needed.

As usual, “science” raises more questions than it answers…