Synopses & Reviews
Medieval painters built up a tremendous range of technical resources for obtaining brilliance and permanence. In this volume, an internationally known authority on medieval paint technology describes these often jealously guarded recipes, lists of materials, and processes.Based upon years of study of medieval manuscripts and enlarged by laboratory analysis of medieval paintings, this book discusses carriers and grounds, binding media, pigments, coloring materials, and metals used in painting.
It describes the surfaces that the medieval artist painted upon, detailing their preparation. It analyzes binding media, discussing relative merits of glair versus gums, oil glazes, and other matters. It tells how the masters obtained their colors, how they processed them, and how they applied them. It tells how metals were prepared for use in painting, how gold powders and leaf were laid on, and dozens of other techniques.
Simply written, easy to read, this book will be invaluable to art historians, students of medieval painting and civilization, and historians of culture. Although it contains few fully developed recipes, it will interest any practicing artist with its discussion of methods of brightening colors and assuring permanence.
"A rich feast," The Times (London). "Enables the connoisseur, artist, and collector to obtain the distilled essence of Thompson's researches in an easily read and simple form," Nature (London). "A mine of technical information for the artist," Saturday Review of Literature.
Synopsis
Sums up 20th-century knowledge: paints, binders, metals, surface preparation. Based on manuscripts and scientific investigation.
Synopsis
Based on authentic medieval manuscripts and laboratory analysis, this volume explains carriers and grounds, binding media, pigments, and coloring materials used to obtain brilliance and permanence. "A rich feast." — The Times (London).
Synopsis
An internationally renowned expert relates the secrets behind the recipes, materials, and processes used by medieval painters to obtain brilliance and permanence. Based on years of study of antique manuscripts and modern laboratory analysis, this volume explains carriers and grounds, binding media, pigments, coloring materials, and metals used in painting. "A rich feast." — The Times (London).
Table of Contents
FOREWORD BY BERNARD BERENESON
PREFACE
INTRODUCTION
I. CARRIERS AND GROUNDS
Terminology
The importance of book painting
Parchment-making
Vellum
Qualities of parchment
Preparations
Wooden surfaces
The functions of gesso
The use of gesso
The construction of a polyptch
Variations of method
Other Grounds
Canvas
Walls and plasters
Structural woodwork
II. BINDING MEDIA
The three orders of binding
Functions of vehicles
Viscosity effects
Effects of transparency
Quantity relations
Optics and art history
Abuses of wax
Media for illumination-Glair
Craftsmanship and aethetic
Craftsmanship and conscience
Craftmanship and industry
Preservation of glair
Glair v. gums
Gum arabic
Gum tragacanth
Size
Adjuncts to glair
Media for panel painting-Egg tempera
Size
Oil glazes
Oils and Varnishes
Media for panel painting-Lime
Origin of true fresco
Palimpsests
Secco painting
Media for structural wood painting
Oil and size
III. PIGMENTS
Classifications
Elements
Minerals
Vegetable extracts
Manufactured salts
BLACK COLOURS
Inks
Lampblack
Vine-charcoal black
Colour grinding
Other carbon blacks
Graphite
Ivory black
BROWN COLOURS
WHITE PIGMENTS
Manufacture of white lead
Modern and medieval white leads
Qualities of white lead
Bone White
Othe inert whites
Lime whites
RED COLOURS
Sinopia
The range of ochres
Appetites for colour
Minium-orange lead
Minium-cinnabar
Natural cinnabar
Vermilion
The invention of vermilion
Early experimental chemistry
Supply and demand
Influence of vermilion
A defect of vermilion
Tempering
The red lakes
Lac Lake
Hedera and lacca
Grain
Confusion of Nomenclature
Confusion of Materials-Kermes
Grain Lakes
Brazil wood
Brazil lakes
Transparent
Opaque
Brazil extracts
The importance of brazil colours
Madder
Dragonsblood
Folium
BLUE COLOURS
Effects of age
Neutrals
Azurite
Preparation of azurite
Characteristics of azurite blues
Indigo
Woad
Woad indigo
Woad cultivation
Manufacture
Social and economic consequences
Compound indigo pigments
Other vegtable blues
Turnsole
Identification
Manufacture
Clothlets
Ultramarine azure
Manufacture
Intrinsic value
Distribution
Artifical copper blues
Blue bice
Copper-lime-ammonia compounds
The silver-blue mystery
The azure-vermilion tangle
PURPLE COLOURS
The whelk reds
Folium and archil
Mixed purples
GREEN COLOURS
Malachite green
The green earths
Verdigris
Effects of age
Verdigris in books
Salt Green and Rouen green
Incompatibilities
Sap Green
Iris Green
Other colours from iris
Honeysuckle and nightshade greens
Mixed greens
YELLOW COLOURS
Medieval use of yellow
Yellow ochres
Orpiment
Realgar
Incompatibilities of orpiment
Bile yellows
Giallorino-Massicot
Substitutes for gold
Mosaic gold
Other imitations of gold
Celandine
Aloes
Saffron
Preperation and use
Other organic yellows
Rhamnus yellows-Extracts and lakes
Weld lakes-Arzica
Fustic and others
IV. METALS
Gold in powder
Fire gilding
Amalgams
Gold in leaf
Thickness of medieval gold
Reflecting surfaces-Burnishing
River gold
Chrysography with gold inks
Unburnished pigment gold
The beginnings of mordant gilding
Composition of a water mordant
Burnished water-mordant gilding
The binders
The colouring agents
The bulk-formers
Other ingredients
Unburnished water mordants
Gilding by attrition
The background of craftsmanship
Burnishers and burnishing
The metallic ground
Gold-the original intent
Preperation of surfaces
&nbs