Watercolor painting Watercolor paint consists of four principal ingredients: a pigment; gum arabic as a binder to hold the pigment in suspension; additives like glycerin, ox gall, honey, and preservatives to alter the viscosity, hiding, durability or color of the pigment and vehicle mixture; and evaporating water, as a solvent used to thin or dilute the paint for application. The more general term "watermedia" refers to any painting medium that uses water as a solvent and that can be applied with a brush, pen, or sprayer. This includes most inks, watercolors, temperas, caseins, gouaches, and modern acrylic paints. The term "watercolor" refers
Gum arabic and Brakna, and used in textile pattern printing, this acacia gum was considered superior to that previously obtained in Arabia. By 1678, the French had driven out the Dutch and established a permanent settlement at Saint Louis at the mouth of the Senegal River, where the French Company of the Senegal River (Compagnie Française du Sénégal) had been trading for more than fifty years. For much of the 19th century, gum arabic was the major export from French and British trading colonies in modern Senegal and Mauritania. France in particular first came into conflict with inland African states over the