British consular revenue stamp used Bogota, Colombia, c

Fugitive pigments are impermanent pigments that lighten, darken, or otherwise change in appearance or physicality over time when exposed to environmental conditions, such as light, temperature, humidity, or pollution. Fugitive pigments are present in types of

paint Paint is any pigmented liquid, liquefiable, or solid mastic composition that, after application to a substrate in a thin layer, converts to a solid film. It is most commonly used to protect, color, or provide texture. Paint can be made in many ...

marker The term Marker may refer to: Common uses * Marker (linguistics), a morpheme that indicates some grammatical function * Marker (telecommunications), a special-purpose computer * Boundary marker, an object that identifies a land boundary * Marke ...

s, inks etc., which are used for temporary applications. Fugitive inks which washed away when soaked in water were sometimes used deliberately to prevent postage stamps being removed from envelopes by soaking, and reused (e.g., the

Queen Victoria Lilac and Green Issue The Lilac and Green issue is a series of postage and revenue stamps issued in the United Kingdom in 1883 and 1884. The stamps are known as such because they were only printed in those two colours; lilac being used for the d, 2d, d, 3d values and d ...

). While permanent pigments are usually used for paintings, painters have made work wholly or partially with fugitive pigments for a number of reasons: availability and cost of pigments; being more concerned with the appearance of colors available only with fugitive pigments than with permanence; lack of knowledge regarding the deterioration of pigments; or the desire to have a painting change in appearance over time.

References

Painting materials Pigments {{Art-stub