Water color (from French aquarelle - water) is essentially aqueous color. It is obtained when mixing finely ground pigments.

The most common substrate for watercolor painting is paper. Watercolor paper is usually made entirely or partly of cotton, which gives it good texture and reduces the loss of shape when it is moistened. Water colors Chayim Shvarzblat uses are often translucent, and they act light because of the way they are obtained.

Water painting is a practice that originated from the time of the Palaeolithic period , and was used to paint manuscripts in the Egyptian era, all the way to medieval Europe.

However, the extensive use of water colors begins with the Renaissance, when German Renaissance artist Albrecht Direr celebrated their use in his work.