Umber

Umber is a natural brown or reddish-brown earth pigment that contains iron oxide and manganese oxide. Umber is darker than the other similar earth pigments, ochre and sienna.Limonite, or hydrated iron oxide, is the basic ingredient of the earth pigments ochre, sienna and umber.The presence of a large amount of manganese makes umber earth colors darker than ochre or sienna.The pigment known as raw umber or natural umber came originally from Umbria, in Italy.Another sample of natural umber pigment.The Italian baroque painter Caravaggio used umber to create the darkness in his chiaroscuro ('light-dark') style of painting.The milkmaid, by Johannes Vermeer (1650). Vermeer used umber for the shadows on the whitewashed walls, since they were warmer than those made with black.Self portrait by Rembrandt van Rijn (1659). Rembrandt used umbers to create his rich and complex browns, as a ground, and to speed the drying of his paintings. Umber is a natural brown or reddish-brown earth pigment that contains iron oxide and manganese oxide. Umber is darker than the other similar earth pigments, ochre and sienna.