Compositions including from about 1% to about 30% by weight of cationic polyvinyl alcohol graft copolymer in an aqueous solution, pigment, and other binding agents are useful in coatings for ink jet printing of paper, textile and plastic substrates, and also as wet end additives for papermaking. The polyvinyl alcohol has a weight average molecular weight between about 13,000 and about 140,000 and is between about 86 and 100 mole % hydrolyzed.