flatwash

1. uncountableA style of painting in which shapes are completely filled with a solid color and have no outlines.

   And yet this group is absolutely monochrome and, as all the cattle in it are painted in ocher flatwash, one actually finds no echo at all of the symbolism that has for so long been mentioned by various authors.

   2004, Jean-Loic Le Quellec, Rock Art in Africa: Mythology and Legend, page 22

present singular third person flatwashes · participle present flatwashing · participle past flatwashed · past flatwashed

1. To paint in a uniform and unshaded color.

   The entrance to the block—a double door with frosted-glass panels—opened into a wide rectangular foyer flatwashed in cream.

   1957, Charles Eric Maine, The Isotope Man, page 70

1. not comparablePertaining to the methods or products of flatwash.

   Here he found a number of engravings some of which were enlivened with a certain amount of flatwash colour, mostly ochre.

   1949, Alan Houghton Brodrick, Lascaux, page 34

   2 more examples

   Attempts to show the essential curves of the animals are well known in both engraving and painting, except for the simple outlines and some of the early flatwash paintings.

   1986, John Waechter, Prehistoric Man: The Fascinating Story of Man's Evolution, page 74

   Sample BPF 3152 was found in the same layer as BPF 3190, and it displays traces of a flatwash figure (complete infill with no outline).

   1997, Maria C. M. Lage, Dating of the Prehistoric Paintings of the Serra Da Capivara National Park, page 51