Baking paintings

I just read the press release for an upcoming show in May at Boijmans about master forger Han van Meegeren's "Vermeers". I'm not much interested in art forgery (or Vermeer's technique, for that matter). One thing jumped out at me, however: Van Meegeren used a thermosetting phenol-formaldehyde resin in his work. That's what Bakelite is, too -- interesting.

Here's a description of his materials from Wikipedia:

"Van Meegeren bought authentic 17th century canvas and mixed his own paints from raw materials (such as lapis lazuli, white lead, indigo, and cinnabar) using old formulas to ensure that they were authentic. In addition, he used badger-hair paintbrushes, similar to those Vermeer was known to have used. He came up with a scheme of using phenol formaldehyde to cause the paints to harden after application, making the paintings appear as if they were 300 years old. After completing a painting, Van Meegeren would bake it at 100 °C (212.0 °F) to 120 °C (248.0 °F) to harden the paint, and then roll it over a cylinder to increase the cracks. Later, he would wash the painting in black India ink to fill in the cracks."

Now that's a creative mix of new and old materials and techniques, huh? I'm a fairly inventive baking painter (or painting baker), but not I'm sure I'd ever have thought of baking my paintings!

Here are some links for further reading:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_van_Meegeren (English)
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_van_Meegeren (Dutch)
http://boijmans.m9.mailplus.nl/nct4321365/267FDCnHHdpVXjj (Dutch)
http://www.boijmans.nl/nl/7/kalender/calendaritem/321 (Dutch)

Working with wax

Yesterday I gave a paper/presentation on (bees)wax in art, primarily focusing on encaustic painting. I promised my classmates I'd put a few links to some videos on encaustic techniques here (see below).

There are eight videos at this youtube channel that are about encaustic painting: http://www.youtube.com/user/FineArtStore#p/c/A5B0DB55743E1DE1, one of these is a general introduction to a basic set-up for encaustics: http://www.youtube.com/user/FineArtStore#p/c/A5B0DB55743E1DE1/0/yHt-x0yIVXg

There's also a demo on R&F Paints here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LU_u4IFCSw&feature=related

Finally, my favorite of all is this video of artist Laura Moriarty working with wax here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QY4WWH4t1ac

Snow day

Unfortunately I had to miss a day of class today. I woke up around 6 and got up and got ready without looking outside. Once I did, I saw a whole new layer of snow had fallen overnight. So after checking the news and weather report, I decided it would be safer to stay home.

It's a bummer, because I'd been looking forward to giving my presentation on WAX! Yes, wax and art. Good stuff. I was supposed to give my presentation last week, but Luuk scheduled an excursion for us on that day. I hope that there will be time for it next week, I'm actually looking forward to sharing what I have found.

It's still snowing out there, has been almost all day. What a winter this has been so far! I am glad it's not been quite as intense as at my bro's place, though (he lives near Washington, D.C.!).

Excursion

Pictures from our excursion to the SRAL:

Slideshow and lecture at the SRAL

Restoration in progress, tempera painting

Great detailed wing, tempera panel being restored

Oil painting, possibly up for restoration

Annemie and the backside of a panel

Warped panel being restored

Madder root

Some of the fabulous sources of pigments (red bole in the foreground, mmm!)

This is Anita's second cousin. He's fixing up the "long Lord" on the table next to him.

Some gilding techniques and madder root

Table full of pigment sources

Azurite

Orpiment (if I remember correctly)

And...Luuk brought delicious taartjes. Yeay, thanks Luuk!

Time for taartjes!

Good resources

I've found an interesting website/shop called Natural Pigments that seems to be pretty useful.
I especially like their pigment info and their tools.
I've also stumbled across an online version of Thompson's The Practice of Tempera Painting. Handy.

Thesis thoughts

Been wrestling with what to write my essay on (it's a pleasant tussle so far, no worries there...). Alchemy is a vast ocean of a subject, and I like swimming in it but soon I'll need to start narrowing my focus so I can crank out a ten-page essay before the end of March. The essay is supposed to concentrate on material/technical aspects of whatever subject we choose. So right now I'm leaning towards working with the doctrine of signatures, or perhaps the element of fire, and how these were applied by artists and alchemists in 16th- and 17th-century Europe. Or maybe hylomorphism. Aww, see...there's just so much to work with!

Black is the new black?

A Belgian artist [Frederik De Wilde] has collaborated with Rice University to make a black 144 times darker than what we now know as black. Hmm. Here are links in Dutch and English relating to this news; there was something going on at Rice around this earlier, too: see this NPR story from 2008.