This book offers artists, the professional as well as the serious amateur, the maximum creative opportunity by explaining how to use particular materials to their best advantage. It provides a source of information on artists' materials, methods, lightfastness, health and safety, care of tools and work which should also appeal to those involved in restoring. There are sections on oil, acrylic, encaustic, watercolour, gouache, gesso, paper, pigments and drawing materials.