A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day c14.s2.21

c14.s2.21

The colours are ground with rice or linseed-water with a little coarse molasses (*gur*), and water only is used in painting. Then, when the painting is completed, it is again rubbed over with the same small trowel. . . . It is considered absolutely necessary that the work should be kept damp from beginning to finish, so that the plaster is not allowed to set until the completion of the picture. When once the smoothly trowelled surface is dry, it bears a distinct sheen or gloss and the colours withstand washing.