A palate was a small shovel in 13th-century French; through time, the name came to refer to the non-porous board on which an artist mixes paints. The most recognizable palette must be the long, thin, curved wooden board held in the hand and resting on the arm of an oil painter. Palettes come in a wide variety, from the plastic or ceramic ones used by watercolour artists to the wet palette of an acrylic artist.
The name "maulstick" comes from the old Dutch term "maalstok," which translates to "painter's stick." They have long been a staple of the painter's toolkit; they may be seen being used by the artist in numerous historical self-portraits.
Light colors cannot be painted over darker ones in watercolor. Painting masking fluid over white paper before painting the darker color over it solves the problem of having to paint around the lighter regions when painting white on black (imagine trying to paint a starry night sky). The masking fluid is removed once the paint has dried to reveal the white paper underneath.
Pochoir is a refined style of stenciling that was popular in the early 20th century. Prehistoric cave paintings frequently contain images created by using the hand as a stencil. Today's street artists, like Banksy and Will St. Leger, are increasingly using stencils.
For various tasks, there are many distinct sorts of brushes. While flat brushes are used to quickly distribute paint over a big area, round brushes with a pointed tip are ideal for painting details. Bright, Filbert, Fan, Rigger, Script, Egbert, and Stencil are other brush varieties.
In both Dutch and German, easel truly means donkey. A suitable moniker considering that easels carry the artist's work for him in the same way that donkeys are used to transport heavy weights.
The palette knife was originally intended to be used for mixing paints on the palette, but it was later discovered to be useful for spreading paint evenly and thickly. Courbet preferred the palette knife in his landscape paintings because he found he could work much more rapidly with it. Rembrandt used palette knives in many of his works and the tool became a characteristic element in his latter career. The palette knife was employed to paint the entire set of Goya's 14 Black Paintings since the artist loved to experiment.
