Encaustic paintingAll paints need a binding agent. Early paints contained a water-based glue (size)

Encaustic paintingAll paints need a binding agent. Early paints contained a water-based glue (size) made from the skins of animals. Later, artists developed a variety of resins, eggs and beeswax.One of the principal fine art techniques of the ancient world, widely used in Egyptian, Greek, Roman and Byzantine art, encaustic painting uses hot beeswax as a binding medium to hold colored pigments and to facilitate their application to a surface. The liquid/paste is then applied to a surface — usually wood panels or walls. Encaustics can be used in sculpture as well as painting. The wax is employed to bind or combine materials and affix them to the sculpted form.image: A 6th-century encaustic icon from Saint Catherine’s Monastery, Mount Sinai. -- source link

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