Ionic Kolinsky Series M collection

A set of Kolinsky brushes for painting figures

Kolinsky is the name of a natural hair that has been used in painting since the nineteenth century and that nothing synthetic has fully replaced to this day. It is springy, it holds a tip even once soaked and it takes considerably more paint into the belly than a synthetic, so a painter does not have to break a stroke to reload. Series M is a set that the paint maker itself put together to go with its figure acrylics.

What the set solves

Buying brushes one at a time makes sense when you know which sizes you use. Anyone starting out with figures, or changing technique, usually finds that the one missing is exactly the one they do not have. A fine tip for eyes and buttons, a medium one for the areas of a cloak, a larger one for base coats and glazes. The set gets round that problem by bringing a graded range all at once. Selected sizes are also separate items, so a worn piece can be replaced later.

Maintenance

Natural hair cannot stand dried paint at the ferrule, which is exactly where a brush is most often ruined. It pays to wash it after every session in lukewarm water with a brush soap, which the maker carries in the same line, and to shape the tip to a point with your fingers. Store them tip upward and never leave them standing in a jar of water; hair once bent cannot be straightened again.

How to spot a worn piece

The hair is ruined from the ferrule, where dried paint builds up and pushes the bundle out to the sides. The first sign tends to be a tip that splits in two once wetted. A piece like that will still serve for base coats and for drybrushing, but no longer for eyes. It therefore pays to keep an order: the new one for detail, the older one for areas.