Hi Rojo, welcome to the forum.

I am not a paint connoisseur, I use W&N Burnt Sienna myself, I find other brands are not the same. I’m not familiar with Brown Ochre I’m afraid, but someone will be along who is.

Doug

The original PBr burnt sienna is darker, I think more manganese stuff in it, and much less tinting. It also looks better on its own, irregular grains, and mixes a more neutral gray. I do not use it much since it seems to be easily overpowered by modern pigments.

New PR101 burnt siennas are just attempts to get the real thing, which I think is a dis-service to both the iron oxide and the burnt sienna. It prevents one from getting the versatility of the iron oxide and fails to deliver the characteristics of burnt sienna.

I do not have burnt sienna on my palette, unless I am doing something that calls for the real thing. Instead, I have an orange iron oxide. This really is different from burnt sienna, more chroma, and much higher tinting. It also mixes a much stronger dark, although it may or may not be truly neutral. The color is very similar to low temperature terracotta, which is abundant in my part of the world, which has iron rich soil. The color is also similar to modern sunburnt tiles and such, since they use the same pigment. I’ve never been to Italy so can’t comment on the local colors there. In painting, it is important to choose a color that is relevant to where you are at, rather than where other painters have been.

I make my colors from powder, and iron oxide is readily available at most places.

I don’t remember what year it was, but I’ve seen in mentioned here that Winsor and Newton actually did switch from their previous supply of PBr7 burnt sienna to the current PR101 sometime back in maybe the 70s. Something about the old source running low.

I don’t remember what year it was, but I’ve seen in mentioned here that Winsor and Newton actually did switch from their previous supply of PBr7 burnt sienna to the current PR101 sometime back in maybe the 70s. Something about the old source running low.

I’ve got the remains of a pan of WN artists burnt Sienna from a 1977 box that I got for my 16 th birthday. Comparing it to the modern Burnt Sienna from the WN travel box I bought a couple of years ago it’s a lot less orange and granulated like crazy. So yes they definitely did change the formula at some point. (I don’t use burnt sienna much, obviously! Most of the other colours have long been replaced)

ORIGINAL USE OF WORD
— burnt sienna — a color, in the reddish-brown range, probably originally based on a tradition, from the Italian Renaissance and before, of a particular (probably iron oxide oriented) pigment in a soil mined in the area of the city of Sienna and prepared with a burning procedure. The color could vary widely, but the behavior of the pigment in the making of paints (which were generally mixed by the artist or his staff in his own studio) and, therefore, to some degree, in the using of paints to paint paintings, would be reliably consistent.
— brown ochre — another color, in the reddish-brown range, probably originally based on a tradition, from well before any written historical records, of a particular reddish, brownish or yellowish color in clumps of earth which contained certain materials (which we now know to be, and to have been, iron oxides and similar minerals), used as a pigment. The color could vary widely, but the staining action of the operative oxide mineral within the soil would be consistently useful for pigment purposes, in such applications as body adornment, cave-wall decoration, and ritual sacrifices.

MODERN PAINT
— burnt sienna, brown ochre — something vaguely red to brown, of any dang color hue-angle intensity chromaticity and value, made with any dang pigment or two or three, with any dang recipe and any dang level of concentration or purity, as chosen arbitrarily by the manufacturer; said choices (of color, recipe, concentration, purity) based as much on advertising and sales intentions, as on artistic fidelity for color and use.

Jane Blundell’s useful chart (linked above) indicates (if I counted correctly) six paints which use PBr7, four with PR101, two with the mineral (not an ASTM numbered pigment!) Hematite, one with PBr6, and one (very surprising) with PO48. Pigments PBr6, PB7, and PR101, and the mineral Hematite, are all iron oxides. PO48, Quinacridone Orange, is a modern synthetic organic pigment with no metals in it, except perhaps as additives or in spinel formulation.

In other words, the claim that any given paint is in fact “Burnt Sienna” or “Brown Ochre” as printed on the tube’s label means almost nothing, except that the marketing department wants you to associate your impending purchase with the notion of being able to paint like an Italian Renaissance master. Or a caveman.

Next we will discuss Van Dyke Brown …

I would not expect brown ochre to be a match. In my experience, it’s akin to a darker, greyer raw sienna. If it was the burnt sienna previously mined in France, then mayhaps the Sennelier (or Jackson’s) burnt sienna be what you’re looking for. They obtain theirs from the historical mine located there.

Correction: although similar pigments are reportedly mined in France, the Sennelier burnt Sienna is obtained from Italy (according to their pigment brochure). Looking at Jane Blundell’s blog, it does seem that Sennelier burnt Sienna is indeed a good match for the old Winsor & Newton burnt Sienna (assuming that the 1890 W&N color was the same sort as yours, and that the color I see on my monitor is accurate). The Sennelier burnt Sienna I own does indeed have an orange glow akin to a transparent orange/red iron oxide.