In visual arts, the support is a solid surface onto which the painting is placed, typically a canvas or a panel.
[3] The hardwood (oak, birch, poplar) panel was the original choice of support for painters in the ancient times.
Many contemporary artists still use panels due to their smooth surface and stability that simplify painting of the small details.
[5] Encaustic is not flexible and requires porous or textured surface, so the canvas on open stretchers will not work, but (scratched) metals and abraded sculptures will.
[7] The oldest known use of fabrics (linen) as a painting support dates back to the Dynasty XII in Egypt (2000 BC).
In Medieval Europe fabrics was overtaken by the wood panels for church use; Renaissance, with its wider spread of paintings, saw wide use of canvas, occasionally glued to the wood, a practice that originated in the Ancient Egypt, but became very popular in the 13th-15th centuries in Italy, with paper sometimes used as a ground layer.
Thin slices of ivory came back as a support for miniatures in the 18th century due to the suitability for painting with transparent colors[23] and ability to imitate the pale skin tones with intense red pigments applied to the back side of the slice.
Artificial fiber boards have one advantage over wood as a support, besides the lower cost: they are homogenous and lack grain and are therefore unlikely to shrink or expand unidirectionally.
[24] Masonite boards are of the particular interest to the painters, as they have a rough side (an imprint of a mesh used in the manufacturing process) with texture resembling a canvas.