Written
South of the city there is a lake that was an open-cast pit until the 1990s. On its eastern bank a seam of yellow clay comes to the surface. I take about two kilos a year.
Washing and grinding
The clay is soaked, sieved and left to settle for a week. What sinks last is the pigment. Dried and ground with a glass muller into linseed oil, two kilos of clay gives three small jars of paint.
Why bother
It is a duller yellow than anything in a tube, and slightly green. It is also the exact colour of the ground I am painting, which no manufacturer can sell me.
