Cadmium Pigments for Artists' Colours

Cadmium pigments have long been a natural choice for use in artists' colours since they were introduced in the early 20th century. Their brightness, clarity of hue, opacity and stability to light, chemicals and solvents ensured their success.

Since those early days, producers have consistently been attentive to the quality and safety of their products. Levels of acid-extractable metals, including cadmium, have been reduced by orders of magnitude, making the pigments safer in use and final application.

The Art & Creative Materials Institute in the USA has an established certification programme to ensure the safety and proper use of art materials. It grants pre-approval status for raw materials and toxicological approval for finished products which are authorised to bear one of the ACMI certification marks (CP, AP or HL).

After working closely with the toxicologists at Duke University, the very low levels of extractable metals from JMB cadmium pigments has guaranteed pre-approval status as a raw material in 100% pigment form.

This offers producers of artists' colours two benefits when selecting JMB cadmium pigments for use in their products:

  • When submitting new formulae containing JMB products to the ACMI, no further laboratory testing of the pigment portion of the formulae is required.
  • When substituting a JMB product in existing ACMI-approved formulae, no further laboratory testing of the pigment portion of the formulae is required upon resubmission of the final product to ACMI.

In either case, when producers, many of whom are ACMI members, seek approval of their products for the American market, they will save both time and money.

Please feel free to contact us for further information and advice on this subject.

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