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Meaning & use

painting

noun·Everyday

Last updated

UK/ˈpeɪntɪŋ/
US/ˈpeɪntɪŋ/

Meanings

  1. nouncountable

    A picture that someone has made using paint.

    Grammar: Countable: you can say a painting, two paintings, the painting on the wall.

    Patterns

    • a painting of someone/something
    • a painting by an artist

    She bought a small painting of a fishing boat for her living room.

    The museum owns several paintings by nineteenth-century French artists.

    There was a strange painting above the fireplace, showing a woman with three eyes.

  2. noununcountable

    The activity or skill of making pictures with paint.

    Grammar: Uncountable when it means the activity: I love painting, not I love a painting.

    Patterns

    • painting and drawing
    • do painting
    • study painting

    Painting is a quiet hobby that helps me relax after work.

    He studied painting in Florence for two years before he became a teacher.

    The children do painting and drawing every Friday afternoon.

Word forms

pluralpaintings

Common combinations

oil painting
The gallery is showing a collection of oil paintings from the 1700s.
a painting by someone
This is a painting by my grandmother, who painted until she was ninety.
a landscape painting
He prefers landscape paintings to portraits.
do a painting
She did a painting of the harbor and gave it to her parents.
a painting hangs
A large painting hangs above the stairs.

Synonyms and how they differ

picture
The general word for any image, including photos and drawings; use painting only when paint was used.
canvas
Often means a painting on cloth, especially in art sales; it is more specific than painting.
artwork
A formal word for any piece of art, not only painted ones.
portrait
Only a painting or photo of a person, so it is narrower than painting.

Word family

paint verb
To make a picture or cover a surface with paint.
paint noun
The colored liquid you put on walls or use to make pictures.
painter noun
A person who paints pictures or paints buildings.

Commonly confused: painting or drawing? painting or printing?

painting vs drawing

A drawing is made with a pencil or pen, while a painting is made with paint and usually a brush.

painting vs printing

Printing means producing text or images with a machine; it sounds similar but has nothing to do with paint.

Practice

There's a beautiful ______ of the harbor hanging in the hall.

Make it your own

Write a sentence using “painting”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.

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