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Sun Oil: Possibly the single most important thing you can get or make, sun oil is the
foundation for a great many different mediums which provide both saturation and various
degrees of grab or tack. A favorite of mine is based on Sun Oil and Spike Lavender mixed 1
to 1. This has an open time of about half an hour used thinly as a couch, can be adjusted to
be tighter with less spike or longer with a bit of thinner oil or a bit of Burnt Plate Oil. Sun oil
can also be thinned with raw oil and heated to make a variety of mediums in the "Oil of
Delft" family. Expensive to buy, can be made easily in a sunny climate in the summer, but
even in Vermont I can make something useful. The best sun oil is made from oil from
which all the water-soluble fatty acid break has been removed prior to thickening. Oil can
also be thickened inside in the studio in a thin layer. This takes longer but is otherwise more
convenient.
The material marketed by Grumbacher as Sun Oil may have seen the sun at some
point in it's process, but is essentially a mixture of much slower drying vacuum bodied oils.
Zecchi is unfortunately doing the same thing.
Unsun Oil: This oil is thickened without heat on lead metal. It has working character
very similar to sun oil, although it is not as sticky and has the potential, when using linseed
oil, to dry very quickly, overnight. Can be used in all mediums the same way, although it
also has some interesting characteristics of its own. Many permutations exist, based on
several years of research. For more details on this process, go here.
Burnt Plate Oil: This is a modern version of the product, sold by Graphic Chemical,
a vacuum-bodied linseed oil in which the volatile components are progressively driven off.
Not really burned at all, this might be thought of as a more evolved version of Stand Oil. #5
is about as thick as Stand Oil, #7 is like cold molasses, but both of these are pale straw
yellow in color and do not yellow on drying. They do take a while to dry and should be used
in small amounts. They also give an unusual increase in paint film saturation.
Heat Bodied Oil: The oldest texts about oil painting all begin with heating the oil.
This creates double carbon bonds among the tri-glycerides and results in an oil which dries
more quickly and has a more resinous character. About 300 Fahrenheit or 150 Celsius is a
good high temperature, eight hours at this temperature day will produce a thicker oil but
with no darkening or compromise in film strength. Oil which is heated to a low temperature
for a long time is also useful, this makes handmade paint with a great deal of natural body.
There are many rheological possibilities to explore here. Heat bodied oil is listed almost
exclusively as the oil used by Van Dyck in National Gallery Technical Bulletin Volume 20.
Putty Mediums: A huge family of mediums with wide-ranging characteristics based
on the translucent and adhesive properties of calcium carbonate -- chalk, calcite, marble
dust, precipitated chalk, whiting -- mixed with oil of varying viscosities in various
proportions. Can be made loose or tight, put in a jar or a tube, or can simply be done on the
palette. Chalk has been found in the work of many older painters including Chardin,
Rembrandt, and Velsquez. Perhaps most importantly, enables traditional oil painting
without using any solvent. For more detail on this family of mediums and their use, you can
go here . The text handout for a workshop I give on these mediums, including various
formulas, is here.
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Fumed Silica Gel: A great alternative to the conservasionally challenged mastic gel
mediums. A simple mixture of the oil of your choice and fumed silica forms a gel of the
consistency of your choice. Can be used for expressive alla prima work or thinly over a
developed underpainting. Fumed silica should be handled carefully wearing a respirator.
Once in the oil, it is not a problem. The gel can be made in quantity and tubed or kept
airtight in aluminum foil. Surprisingly versatile, but not the fastest drier. Should be made
with pre-heated or otherwise pre-stabilized oil.
"Strassburg" Method: This is from a manuscript in Strassburg consulted by
Eastlake, the method was written down in the 15th century but Eastlake feels it's language
indicates an even earlier origin. This method involves adding a drop or two of varnish to the
paint on the palette. When done in the period way with a cooked resin varnish such as
sandarac, copal, and especially amber, the paint seizes, producing an innate facility of
manipulation that is not part of the behavior of commercial tube paint. When done with
handmade paint using a heat bodied oil -- the original method -- the results are even more
dramatic. It is important to be discreet in the use of any hard resin varnish, as these are so
strong -- compared to dammar -- that they are easily capable of producing a surface so
glassy that it must be ground down to accept further paint.
Silver Fir: Of the quality soft resins, Silver Fir, or Olio di Abezzo, has been in the
longest use over the centuries. This is also perhaps the single resinous material about
which I have never read anything negative in an old or new text. Thick in it's natural state,
best used thinned significantly, can be substituted for the more brittle dammar in a
medium, dries with a slightly less glassy shine. Unlike it's relative Canada Balsam, dries
reliably.
Egg Emulsion Mediums: Egg yolk is an extremely permanent natural organic
emulsion which makes a medium which has a tendency to set quickly and typically dries
overnight. An incredible variety of working characteristics can be achieved using an egg
yolk as the basis for an emulsion medium. Working on panels, I've been able to explore a
wide range of different formulas based on the standard proportion of one part "other" to one
part yolk. Kurt Wehlte's excellent book -- see bibliography below -- contains a good
discussion of this family of mediums. Not recommended, however, for work on
unsupported canvas.
Titanium White: This modern pigment is about ten times more opaque than Flake
White. As such, making subtle tones or values with titanium is about ten times more
difficult. Add to this the fact that older painters often used a flake white -- lootwit -- which
was further cut by a significant addition of chalk, and you can see why it was easier for
them to produce a fully developed value scale with appropriate warm and cool emphasis.
While there are modern painters who have adapted their style to working with titanium,
beginning with strongly warm darks which can handle the subsequent strongly cool lights
produced by titanium, this system cannot produce the older look. If you find yourself feeling
that using white is "ruining" your paintings or is presenting the classic titanium chalky value
syndrome, you might make a simple oil and marble dust putty, an un-paint of very little
covering power, and begin using titanium which has been cut substantially with this.
Price: When something becomes a fine art material, the price tends to go up.
Sometimes in a way that is acceptable, sometimes in a way that is egregious. I recently
found whiting at 12.00 a pound on a major commercial website, plus shipping. Whiting is
basic calcium carbonate, available at not much more than that for a 50 lb bag at a pottery
supply outlet. I mention this because, in spite of the fact that progress has been made in
the labeling of materials, the endless sense of the middleman that painters are simply pieeyed idealists ripe for the plucking continues unabated into our time. Look around, there are
always alternatives to the great shell game of the catalogs. And please consider making
your own materials when possible, this isn't exactly rocket science.
background
size
Very standard: 3T rabbit skin glue to 2 cups water. For panels hide glue is an okay
substitute. Allow the glue to swell for several hours. Heat gently to liquify, don't let it come
even close to boiling, use a water bath. Apply to panels to seal them, to linen or canvas on
stretchers or panels. Most authorities recommend sanding the first coat and removing any
slubs in the linen with a blade, then applying a second coat. Robert Doak recommends a
more minimal and absorbent sizing and priming combination with the sealant provided by a
tempera underpainting. This approach is perhaps more relevant to canvas than panel. This
size will gel firmly at room temperature and should be kept in the refrigerator for any kind of
longevity in warm weather. If some of it liquifies in the fridge pour off the liquid, rinse, and
use what's still a gel.
gesso
oil gesso
There are many recipe variations on the idea of emulsifying some oil into a glue gesso to
create a more flexible and less absorbent surface. This is the traditional gesso most often
recommended for use on unsupported canvas. I've found that adding a small amount of oil
creates a material which has more of a gelatinous body similar to acrylic gesso and can be
used to create slightly textured surfaces by dragging, pouncing, sponging, etc. However,
this material does yellow somewhat. The proportion is: 12 oz. of gesso with 2 oz. of oil
added: I use 1 oz. of fumed (thickened) oil and 1 oz. of Eminent Oil, see recipe below. (This
proportion, 1 to 6, is much less than the usual proportion recommended for unsupported
canvas. On the other hand, many older paintings were made on unsupported canvas with
a thin coat of traditional gesso alone over the sizing). The oil goes in easiest if the gesso is
semi-gelled, i.e. not warm enough to use. Add the oil bit by bit and stir, this will cause the
gesso to thicken or seize. Then heat gently in hot water and use. This can also be used as
a final coat over traditional gesso.
Another oil-glue emulsion gesso. I developed it for use on paper, but it works well on linen
over panel. The paper -- I use Tiepolo -- is given a coat of size. After the size dries, coat it
with this gesso: 7/8 cup size, 1 3/4 cup water, 1 cup titanium white, 2 cups marble dust, 2
oz. oil. For this I used refined walnut oil that's been preheated to 150C for two to four hours
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to help minimize any long term yellowing. The gesso is thin when warm and the oil doesn't
emulsify until the gesso begins to cool. Just be patient and do other stuff. When you stir the
gesso and the oil stays in suspension -- doesn't float to the top -- that's when you can use
it. Its a bit thick, so the idea is to brush it out very well, as the oil in the gesso allows it to do
so and the marble dust allows it to hold a very fine texture. This will take straight paint very
nicely for hours with no additional medium or manipulation, without having the unforgiving
grab of an absorbent all-glue gesso.
No.2: This variation substitutes sun oil or stand oil for half the oil amount above and as
a result creates more textural possibilities. Its also trickier to work with, the gelatinous
quality makes it easy to create accidental bare spots on paper. You can also make this
gesso by adding lukewarm glue to the dry ingredients, then the oil, then adding COLD
water to make. This will help avoid having to wait for it to cool down enough for the oil to
remain in suspension.
No.3: This is for canvas or linen mounted on stretchers and uses a total of 6 oz. of oil; I
used 2 parts thin preheated walnut oil to 1 part thickened walnut oil. This proportion is still
significantly less than the 50% of oil in standard recipes. After preparing and curing, I was
able to roll this linen at a diameter of two inches or so without it cracking. When folded over
itself hard, it cracks.
Small panels can be made from 1/2 inch cabinet grade plywood, up to 12x16, finished in
maple or birch, without danger of warping. It is best to 3/4 inch cabinet grade plywood for
larger work, this works for panels up to say 18x24 inches. Above that size use 1/4 inch
plywood and cradle it with strips of the plywood. If you can find the good mahogany
plywood you can use that too. Other surfaces are fine they just cost more. The Baltic birch
plywood is great for smaller panels and can usually be special ordered from a lumber yard.
At this point I avoid hardboard, although there's an interesting new product called Medite
which is resin-impregnated and might solve the major issues of warping and acid.
Sand the corners and the edges of the best surface and apply a warm and very
generous coat of the glue above to the top and sides, it needs to be thick on top so the
linen can be burnished flat in the end. Let dry. The back of the panel can be coated with
shellac or another spirit varnish to help seal it from moisture, this is most relevant for
panels made from 1/2 inch or less. Now cut the linen large enough to wrap the edges over
the panel and staple to the back. Cut out the corners leaving about 1/4 inch overlap. Staple
the linen to the panel, not at all tight, working from the middle of each edge towards the
corners and folding the corners over neatly. If your linen is wrinkled you can spray it now
with a little water and it'll shrink flat so you can see if it's tight enough. It doesn't have to be
tight at this point, just even. Apply another generous coat of very warm glue to this panel so
that the glue soaks through and bonds the linen to the panel. Get the edges. Burnish this
hard with a tool like a bone folder while it is wet to bond the linen to the panel evenly and
smooth the surface. Burnish again or sand lightly when dry and remove any imperfections
with a very sharp blade. Add one more thin coat of glue if you've sanded, let dry. Now brush
on two or three thin coats of traditional gesso, alternating brushing direction and allowing to
dry between coats. If you use gesso modo mio above, you can use two well-brushed out
coats.
pre-gessoed linen
Sometimes its good to have unmounted prepared linen: the composition can be adjusted if
the edges are expandable. This can be done over large, heavy weight stretchers -- the
linen is sized, gessoed or primed, then cut into pieces when dry. The linen can also be
stretched not too tightly over a piece of plywood or a hollow core door covered with plastic - sheeting for weather-proofing, or a cut open garbage can liner, taped tight -- then sized it
and gessoed it when dry. This takes a little longer to dry as the glue and gesso can only
evaporate in one direction, and it sometimes bubbles a bit, but these go away. The
advantage of this method is the ability to burnish the linen when the size is applied so that
I've got a more regular surface. There's still plenty of texture and the glue gesso recipes
here are also quite grippy, but the surface is more even, making the initial layer of paint
easier to apply.
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A lead ground has great working qualities. Once you've put the glue on the panels above
you can go directly to white lead or you can put a coat of glue gesso on and then go to lead.
If you use lead over the glue try applying it the traditional way with a spatula not a brush.
Wait at least a week between coats and then at least two weeks before painting on it.
Longer is better; some people wait much longer in order to be sure the ground is truly dry.
For a leaner coating you can thin the lead a bit with turpentine and then add marble dust to
bring the consistency back. I've used one coat of this lean lead over glue gesso with good
results. White lead is toxic, please use all normal safety precautions when dealing with it.
I'd also have to say that, if you're persnickety about brilliance, I have noticed a certain
lowering of tone with a white lead ground. I'd call it artistic rather than defective, but its
there. At this point, given a preference for panels and the fact that the gesso ground
precedes the white lead ground historically, I'm using various gesso grounds exclusively.
Don't have to wait.
paint
tube paint
Handmade paint made with cold-pressed, painter-refined oil is naturally long, tube paint
made from modern oil, stabilizers and additives is naturally short. Handmade paint also
dries more quickly than tube paint: the last thing a manufacturer wants is limited shelf-life.
The slickness of tube paint can to some extent be overcome when necessary by various
combinations of OM materials in a medium. The various Groves mediums are all designed
with enough resin strength to do this easily. In making mediums myself, I've been most
successful using various hard resin and leaded oil combinations, various putties made
from leaded oil and stone dust, as well as the egg emulsions, although the latter needs to
be used on a panel. For broken applications, the oil would be in the form of sun oil,
thickened Eminent oil, or a combination. For smooth ones, in the form of Eminent Oil
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inert additions
There are several inert substances that have been added to paint historically, most
commonly ground leaded glass and calcite, although chalk and ground quartz have been
used as well. Quartz, leaded glass, and calcite are translucent but not transparent, they
don't add sparkle. Used with commercial paint, all these in moderation help to counteract
its mayonnaise-like slickness. Leaded glass has gotten lots of recent press, and has a
decided siccative quality: Eastlake mentions its use by the Venetians. Not that fine, I've
found it most applicable to underpaintings, giving the paint a definite tooth for the next layer,
and as part of an impasto medium for broken surfaces. Kremer has a quartz variety called
cristobalite which makes a very interesting paste when mixed with oil, rheologically
complex, sort of like what cornstarch does in water. I've found small additions of this helpful
in increasing movement while maintaining density, also very useful in underpainting.
For an expansion of this information into the realm of putty mediums, please go to living
craft.
putty mediums
Beginning in the winter of 2007, based on information in "Rembrandt: Art in the Making" by
the National Gallery staff, I began to work exclusively with a putty medium made from
various combinations of oil and stone dust. This proved to be a path out of the technical
labyrinth. The associated information is too long for this page and has moved to living craft
and the putty medium.
When oil is combined with industrial fumed silica it forms a gel. Various viscosities of oil
can be used and various ultimate viscosities of gel can be achieved. Works well for both
lively alla prima work and as a couch in later layers in more formal painting. The key here is
knowing the behavior of your oils well and using as little of this medium as will do the job
effectively. Vastly preferable to the fragile mastic gel mediums, can be made to perform in a
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effectively. Vastly preferable to the fragile mastic gel mediums, can be made to perform in a
similar way. Fumed silica is very light and needs to be handled with care using a respirator.
The gel can be made in bulk and stored in tubes or wrapped airtight in aluminum foil. If you
get into this, try some small studies and tests first to get an idea of how it handles before
making larger amounts.
silver fir
This material is similar in consistency to Canada Balsam, the Olio d'Abezzo extolled by
Eastlake, and everyone who has ever written about it. It doesn't smell as nice as Canada
Balsam, but it performs better. It dries, quickly and always. I use it in mediums diluted with
two or three parts solvent by warming the resin first in a waterbath until its quite liquid. A
thin coat of this is dry to the touch in a few hours under almost all conditions. Eastlake
quotes several older Italian writers who say to use this as a final varnish, but he also
quotes de Mayerne quoting Rubens to the effect that some thickened oil should be added.
In any event, a material with centuries of use that dries reliably, but the hard to get at this
point, only available to my knowledge through Zecchi. Canada Balsam is fine too if you are
close enough to a source with good turn-around and use it quickly.
isolating varnish
An isolating varnish is used to seal an absorbent ground so that it won't become yellowed
over time by the oil in the paint. They're also used between layers in thin painting
techniques as the simplest form of couch to create depth and help maintain tonal
discretion. Because of the high solvent content, they also supply some bite and provide a
degree of tack as the solvent evaporates. Strasbourg (Silver Fir) Turpentine works well
here diluted 1 to 4 with turpentine or spike. Apply thinly, make sure your underlayer is dry.
N.B. -- This technique is a little controversial with purists because you end up violating the
fat over lean principle: these resin layers are lean over paint which is fat, and there will be
different coefficients of shrinkage for these layers over time. Not sure if I buy this since the
varnish layer is incredibly thin. Also, spike has more bite than turpentine into the underlayer,
helpful when dealing with a hard resin in that layer, otherwise, possibly too much otherwise.
fir medium
A basic smooth painting medium using the ingredients I've found most reliable. The stock
solution of this is: 4 parts Fir 1:2 with solvent, 1 part solvent, 1 part Sun Walnut Oil, 1 part
Eminent Oil. At 20 ml each, this fits into a standard amber glass vitamin bottle. Mix
ingredients and place in a waterbath, cap on bottle loosely, bring to a boil for ten minutes.
This proportion allows a reasonable amount of fusion and is dry in a moderate layer the
next day. Can be further thinned with Fir 1:2 for more hold, or more thickened oil in later
layers for more fusion. Can also be used as a couch. Can be made without Eminent Oil,
but the Eminent Oil gives it a thixotropic quality.
Roberson-type Mediums
Roberson formulas, I'd say his version had a lot more lead in it than any I've made.
According to the Tate book on the Pre-Raphaelites, this medium doesn't degrade or yellow:
it was also used by Lord Leighton, arguably one of the more fastidious painters ever. So, if
you're making a Maroger-type medium, this is an easy development that offers the added
protection of a hard resin varnish and can be used both in a careful or more abandoned
manner. This should be used sparingly, on panels, and with the understanding that it will
yellow somewhat over time. However, especially when used in a freer manner, it is quite
charismatic.
strasbourg method
On page 130 of "Methods and Materials", see bibliography below, Eastlake gives an
extensive quote from a fifteenth century manuscript from the library of "Strassburg",
Germany. The instructions are to boil the oil with driers and then use it to make paint, which
is to be ground thickly, then made thinner with oil. The paint is then modified on the palette
with a small quantity of varnish. I've adapted this method as follows: the paint is made with
72 hour oil, no additional driers, and tubed. A small amount of amber or other resin hard
resin varnish is added to the paint on the palette, causing the paint to seize: one drop per
1/4 teaspoon of paint does this. Amber is not added to the white, see below. The paint is
then thinned with solvent for opening layers, then a bit of Eminent Oil, then a bit of Eminent
oil and sun oil, etc., moving progressively from lean to fat.
sanding
egg
A small amount of egg yolk added to lead white paint made with a slightly heat bodied oil
will seize very tightly. For a complete illustration of this process, please go here and scroll
down a bit.
resin-egg emulsions
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This is more a family of mediums than just one. This type of tempera grassa medium is
versatile and permanent on panel but was not used in older painting: the evidence seems
to be that, while egg tempera and oil were mixed in thin layers in paintings during the
transitional period, very little if any tempera grassa was used. Both oils and resins can be
emulsified with egg yolk, so the combinations are endless. One feature of most of these
combinations is a quick set and relatively fast drying time, creating an ability to do a great
deal in an initial sitting. They can also be engineered to be many levels of gloss from dead
flat to saturated to reasonably shiny. One potential minus is the need to work a medium like
this on a panel, as egg ultimately dries quite hard and inflexible. The usual proportion for a
medium like this is one part egg yolk to one part other ingredients, but by using amber and
combining in a specific order, more "other" can be achieved. An example recipe would be:
To two parts egg yolk add two parts Eminent Oil, stir or shake to emulsify. Then add 2 parts
isolating varnish -- I use balsam or fir, cut with three parts turpentine -- and emulsify. Then
add 3/4 part amber varnish, stir, it will seize. This should be further thinned with turpentine
as needed, in the beginning of the painting especially. Slightly more resin and oil could be
added towards the end of the work.
heat-enhanced emulsions
Another way of making an egg emulsion medium involves combining all the "other
ingredients", heating ten minutes in a boiling water bath, and then whisking this right away
into the egg yolk, the method used to make a zabaglione. This creates different handling
characteristics than cold emulsifying, is fluffier but also more firmly bound, and enables
even more volume of "other" to be incorporated without breaking the emulsion: about 4 to 1.
In this case, I leave out any spike or turpentine, so that the hot fluid added to the egg yolk is
as viscous as it can be. The yolks should still be room temperature, add the hot fluid slowly
at first. I've made versions of this with various proportions of amber, Eminent Oil, and fir
fused into oil as the "other", and it seems like a technical step forward from the cold
method above although involving another level of effort. If you've worked with egg
emulsions and like them you'll enjoy this method, just don't spoon it on top of alpine
strawberries for dessert. On the plus side, I've been able to store this type of medium over
several months in a tube. It can be used as an initial addition to tube paint on the palette
with wide latitude. I'd again stess that this type of medium, while in my view incredibly
permanent, needs to be used on panels because its ultimate hardness is also inflexible. It
can be given a variety of different personalities depending on the proportion and identity of
resinous and oily components.
white
It's simple to make your own white with lead carbonate and
oil; it doesn't need to be ground and becomes "paint" pretty
much instantly just by mixing on a piece of glass with a knife.
You then have control over what oil, how much, how dry to
make it, what else to add. If you're interested in 17th century
technique you can try experimenting with additions of calcite
for transparency, or ground leaded glass to get the famous Rembrandt drizzle effect. A
formula I've used for a more transparent veiling or finishing white is 2 parts lead carbonate,
1 part calcite, and 1 part zinc white. However, zinc white does become brittle and should
only be used on panels. In a careful layered system -- Perugino, Raphael -- the texture or
viscosity of the white isn't a factor, but in the later Flemish system -- Rubens, Rembrandt -or in the unique system of Velazquez, the rheology of the white paint becomes focal. The
white of older painting is white lead made by the stack process, this contained mostly lead
carbonate, some lead hydroxide, and a small amount of lead acetate. The relative opacity
and rheology of this paint could also be varied by additions of inert ingredients such as
calcite, marble dust, leaded glass, silica, and mica. Each ingredient imparts specific
characteristics to the paint: leaded glass has a tendency to make the paint more elastic or
stringy, mica makes it more slippery, silica and the calcium minerals tend to make it denser
and more adhesive. In the 19th century, lead white was available with several different
proportions of marble dust added, resulting in more transparency and more adhesion as
the proportion of calcium increased.
In the area of developing a specific texture and personal handling characteristics,an
amazing amount can be done with white. There are many interesting varieties of white that
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can be made with zinc oxide as an addition to lead carbonate. But the whites I've made
most are based on the addition of ground leaded glass to lead carbonate and heat-bodied
oil, and the addition of marble dust to lead carbonate and heat-bodied oil. A very small
amount of ground leaded glass will create a more mobile and stringy paint. Marble dust, or
calcite, acts more as an adhesive or immobilizer. In one system that's evolved, these
whites are used as is on the palette, while the other paints are modified with a bit of hardresin varnish -- usually amber -- and a bit of thickened oil. While the whites has a viscous
mobility in its original state, any contact with amber makes it set firmly, allowing for a
significant amount of broken-surface development in a given layer, including a thin glaze
over dense paint which has set but isn't yet dry. (Please note that lead carbonate is TOXIC
when ingested or inhaled and take all standard appropriate precautions when using this
material: wear a particle mask, wear gloves, wash well before eating, observe rigorous
studio hygiene for rags and any stray pigment. Repeated exposure to small amounts of
lead can lead to poisoning).
a different white
An experiment with the technique of coating pigment particles with protein to protect them
from the oil. This technique has been re-pioneered by Michael Price in a very interesting
article available on his site. Donald Fels, referencing this technique in his great "Lost
Secrets of Flemish Painting", points out that an addition of a binder may well have been
part of the cones in which lead white was sold to hold down its toxic dust. Adding these
pieces of information to the consistent presence of egg in Rembrandt's impasto, I thought it
would be worth a try.
First, I washed the lead carbonate three times, removed the dense foam each time,
and then added a solution of one egg yolk to six ounces of water. Let this settle thoroughly,
decanted the solution off, and spread the paste in the sun on glass to dry. This was loosely
bound, but quite friable. When ground with unrefined walnut oil, this paint exhibited
completely different characteristcs than any lead white I've ever used or made. It was
short, light, and facile, not dense, or sticky. It had no ropiness yet had body and made
texture well with or without amber and a bit of thickened oil. In the parlance of my former
profession, it held stiff peaks. And of course, the pigment is protected from the oil by the
coating of yolk so it will not transparentize over time.
I can't say whether this was an historical material of course, but it would have been
very easy to grind pigment with a bit of glue or egg to guarentee its long-term opacity. (And
anybody who thinks they weren't that smart or subtle hasn't been chasing them for very
long). Perhaps most importantly from the point of view of this sort of right brain research, (I
ordered an electron microscope but it hasn't come yet), it is easy and fun to work with.
So if you try this please observe all the precautions necessary when dealing with a
TOXIC substance like lead carbonate. The particular dust hazard here is in the first wetting
of the pigment which should be done gently wearing a mask.
bibliography
had recently been translated into English and was quite popular. Also, Eastlake is speaking
to an audience whose sense of painting is different than ours: while he might seem to
ramble or be inconclusive, he is just pointing out the many options that modern authors
often ignore. The more I read this, the more it makes sense and has proved helpful, but it's
taken a few years to penetrate. Interestingly, De Mayerne's approach is much more direct
and "modern" in comparison: he simply records what he heard, what he did, and whether it
worked..
Medieval and Renaissance Treatises on the Art of Painting - Mrs. Mary P. Merrifield
Published originally in 1849, Mrs. Merrifield is easier to navigate than Eastlake, and is
again actively involved in going back in time to recover pieces of the puzzle. The book
begins with a three hundred page catalogue of materials and technical information, much
of which was gathered from current Italian sources and is Italian and full of contradictory
bravado to the point of comedy, but the pages of Mrs. Merrifield's own observations at the
end of this section are quite cogent and perceptive. The subsequent manuscripts are tenth
to seventeenth century and contain endless recipes in the old manner -- which often
assumes that you already know exactly what you're doing - much of the content of which is
actually related to arts other than painting. But, in each of them -- the Bolognese
Manuscript (fifteenth century), the Marciana Manuscript (sixteenth century), Paduan
Manuscript (seventeenth century), and Brussels Manuscript (1635, by Le Brun) -- there are
some good recipes to note, especially recipes for varnish. Along with Eastlake, Mrs.
Merrifield is very interested in painting systems, drying oils, and amber varnish. Not the
most condensed practical book, requires lots of patient perusing, but an important part of
the story whose historical sources confirm the main tenets of the system.
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somewhat loony to really important, but I've found the mindset of another time to be very
helpful: these guys were very hands-on and very curious in an alchemical way: if it didn't
work, they tried again! (On the other hand, I see DeMayerne's domestic staff as in a state
of permanent chaos). Fels points out that to paint like a 17th century painter you have to be
able to think like one. Short of setting the Wayback for the year 1620, this is the answer. If
you've read Eastlake and want more, at least get this from the library for a bit.
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Contains a small but highly informative technical section and great close-up photos, as
well as a well-done historical text.
Contains a great deal of interesting information about period methods and materials
from the somewhat unfortunate perspective of producing accurate fakes. Cocky, bitter, in
some places downright ugly, but somehow worth it, a glimpse at the artworld's very dirty
laundry. Not as complete as it might be: although written in 1997 Hebborn doesn't mention
Lead Tin Yellow in his Forger's Palette: it would certainly be in mine!
A tremendous number of older, out-of-print texts are available here, really well done by
excellent painter Danny Van Ryswyk.
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First published in 1835, there are several later editions of this by different editors. Field
was a highly respected colorman in the earlier part of 19th century London who improved
the manufacture of madder pigments and produced other pigments of interest such as
Field's orange vermilion. His writing is no nonsense, pithy and perceptive. A PDF of the text
is available if you do a book search on Google.
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