Mussini oil colors are the signature product of Schmincke, made in Germany since the company’s founding in 1881. It is the absolute finest oil color available to the contemporary painter, with unsurpassed handling characteristics, a wide range of colors, and a conservation-friendly approach that emphasizes permanence and stability in your finished work.

The experience of painting with Mussini colors is magical. It is the sort of medium that changes the way you work, introducing new creative options and improving the artist’s control over the finished work. The world-unique recipe includes dissolved damar resin in perfect balance with a blend of painting oils (walnut, linseed, and safflower) tailored to each color.

The soft, pleasant smell of damar resin, derived from the sap of certain trees in Southeast Asia, is Mussini’s calling card. Schmincke’s chemists use natural resin in various proportions, depending on the color, to make each tube of Mussini luminous and glossy. The transparent colors (there are an industry-leading 44 of them in the Mussini lineup) are otherworldly. Intense and complex even when applied in thin glazes, these colors allow you to follow the Old Masters in building your work through subtle layering.

You will notice that Mussini handles differently than other oil colors. The resin gives Mussini a more defined paint body that clings to the brush or knife and allows for precise application on the canvas. Mussini is smooth and brushable from the tube, but with a little bit of painting medium or thinner, it becomes even more luxurious, allowing you to create perfectly continuous gradients and more harmonious patterns of light and shadow.

Since Mussini is a professional-grade oil color, permanence is of the highest importance. Every color is lightfast, with most shades carrying Schmincke’s highest lightfastness rating. The unique formulation also prevents cracks and uneven shrinkage, which can be an issue with other oil paints, with a tension-free drying process thanks to evaporation of the damar resin from inside the paint body.

35 mL tube. Made in Germany.