Preamble
This is the twentieth post in a new Art Resource series that specifically focuses on techniques used in creating artworks. For your convenience I have listed all the posts in this new series below:
Drawing Art
Painting Art - Part I
Painting Art - Part II
Painting Art - Part III
Painting Art - Part IV
Painting Art - Part V
Painting Art - Part VI
Home-Made Painting Art Materials
Quality in Ready-Made Artists' Supplies - Part I
Quality in Ready-Made Artists' Supplies - Part II
Quality in Ready-Made Artists' Supplies - Part III
Historical Notes on Art - Part I
Historical Notes on Art - Part II
Historical Notes on Art - Part III
Historical Notes on Art - Part IV
Historical Notes on Art - Part V
Tempera Painting
Oil Painting - Part I
Oil Painting - Part II
Oil Painting - Part III
Oil Painting - Part IV
Oil Painting - Part V
Oil Painting - Part VI
Pigments
Classification of Pigments - Part I
Classification of Pigments - Part II
Classification of Pigments - Part III
Pigments for Oil Painting
Pigments for Water Color
Pigments for Tempera Painting
Pigments for Pastel
Japanese Pigments
Pigments for Fresco Painting - Part I
Pigments for Fresco Painting - Part II
Selected Fresco Palette for Permanent Frescoes
Properties of Pigments in Common Use
Blue Pigments - Part I
Blue Pigments - Part II
Blue Pigments - Part III
There have been another one hundred and thirteen posts in a previous Art Resource series that have focused on the following topics:
(i) Units used in dyeing and printing of fabrics;
(ii) Occupational, health & safety issues in an art studio;
(iii) Color theories and color schemes;
(iv) Optical properties of fiber materials;
(v) General properties of fiber polymers and fibers - Part I to Part V;
(vi) Protein fibers;
(vii) Natural and man-made cellulosic fibers;
(viii) Fiber blends and melt spun fibers;
(ix) Fabric construction;
(x) Techniques and woven fibers;
(xi) Basic and figured weaves;
(xii) Pile, woven and knot pile fabrics;
(xiii) Nainkage, durable press and wash-wear finishes;
(xvi) Classification of dyes and dye blends;
(xv) The general theory of printing.
To access any of the above resources, please click on the following link - Units Used in Dyeing and Printing of Fabrics. This link will highlight all of the one hundred and thirteen posts in the previous a are eight data bases on this blogspot, namely, the Glossary of Cultural and Architectural Terms, Timelines of Fabrics, Dyes and Other Stuff, A Fashion Data Base, the Glossary of Colors, Dyes, Inks, Pigments and Resins, the Glossary of Fabrics, Fibers, Finishes, Garments and Yarns, Glossary of Art, Artists, Art Motifs and Art Movements, Glossary of Paper, Photography, Printing, Prints and Publication Terms and the Glossary of Scientific Terms. All data bases in the future will be updated from time-to-time.
If you find any post on this blog site useful, you can save it or copy and paste it into your own "Word" document for your future reference. For example, Safari allows you to save a post (e.g. click on "File", click on "Print" and release, click on "PDF" and then click on "Save As" and release - and a PDF should appear where you have stored it). Safari also allows you to mail a post to a friend (click on "File", and then point cursor to "Mail Contents On This Page" and release). Either way, this or other posts on this site may be a useful Art Resource for you.
The new Art Resource series will be the first post in each calendar month. Remember - these Art Resource posts span information that will be useful for a home hobbyist to that required by a final year University Fine-Art student and so undoubtedly, some parts of any Art Resource post may appear far too technical for your needs (skip those mind boggling parts) and in other parts, it may be too simplistic with respect to your level of knowledge (ditto the skip). The trade-off between these two extremes will mean that Art Resource posts will be hopefully useful in parts to most, but unfortunately may not be satisfying to all!
Oil Painting - Part III [1]
During the eighteenth century, and more so during the nineteenth, the knowledge and intelligent study of the methods and materials of painting fell into a sort of dark age, from which our contemporary painters have by no means entirely emerged. Good craftsmanship and a thorough knowledge of materials and methods continued to be of concern to some painters, but they were exceptions to the general trend.
The Cornfield is an oil painting by the English artist John Constable, completed from January to March 1826 in the artist’s studio. The painting shows a lane leading from East Bergholt toward Dedham, Essex, and depicts a young shepherd boy drinking from a pool in the heat of summer. The location is along Fen Lane, which the artist knew well. Constable referred to the piece as 'The Drinking Boy.'
The beginning of the era of great industrial and scientific development released artists from a number of details of labor indirectly essential to their work, so that they began to concentrate their efforts entirely on the planning, design and execution of their work, leaving the preparation of materials and other auxilliary work to specialists, upon who they eventually became thoroughly dependent.
Jan van Kessel, 'Bleaching Fields.' Oil on canvas. 1670's near Haarlem in the Netherlands.
The first effect of this development on the practice of painting techniques was to end the necessity of the artist learning the laborious hand or small-scale methods of manufacturing his/her own materials. Instead of giving the art student some degree of organized training in the principles underlying the properties and uses of materials as a substitute for the practical experience stressed in former times, the entire subject was eventually ignored.
In 1718, Marshall Smith invented a "Machine or Engine for the Grinding of Colors" in England. It is not known precisely how it operated, but it was a device that increased the efficiency of pigment grinding dramatically. Soon, a company called Emerton and Manby was advertising exceptionally low-priced paints that had been ground with labor-saving technology.
Traditions relative to handling painting materials survived for some time, but inasmuch as these were passed on in terms of effect or "how," without regard for cause or "why," they soon degenerated to a set of fixed rules, and by the end of the nineteenth century we find few painters equipped with an intelligent understanding of the craft.
Examples of painters' materials in the London area in the sixteenth century (prices per pound).
It was a short step from this attitude to the conviction that too great a concern with the fundamentals of technically correct practice would interfere with or hamper the free expression of artistic intention. The bulk of the work produced by men with this belief has become generally, in all artistic circles, the least valued from a technical viewpoint.
In 1814, American portrait painter John G. Rand invented the first oil paint tube. With oil paint packaged and sealed in tin tubes to preserve its texture and consistency, artists were no longer confined to paint inside their studios, providing the possibility for en plain air painting.
One of the first results was the general acceptance during the 1700s of the theory that the great masters of the past had mysteriously and closely guarded secrets through which they obtained the effects and permanence of their works. Many artists of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries seriously attempted to improve their craftsmanship by continual independent study and experiment, and they worked on their media until they attained fine control and the exact expression of their artistic intentions but failed to secure permanent results; a great many of these pictures have deteriorated within a comparatively short time. This can be attribued to misguided effort in search for the "secrets of the old masters."
Removing Discolored Varnish.
It has been suggested that the word secrets as used in the medieval recipe books was not employed in the sense that such information was always jealously withheld. There is much evidence that such information was freely circulated among members of the craft, as it is today, and that it was not until more recent times, when this resurrected knowledge was not passed by the majority if it had a direct commercial or competitive value, and so was more jealously guarded.
Reference:
[1] The Artist's Handbook of Materials and Techniques, R. Mayer (ed. E. Smith) 4th Edition, Faber and Faber, London (1981).
This is the twentieth post in a new Art Resource series that specifically focuses on techniques used in creating artworks. For your convenience I have listed all the posts in this new series below:
Drawing Art
Painting Art - Part I
Painting Art - Part II
Painting Art - Part III
Painting Art - Part IV
Painting Art - Part V
Painting Art - Part VI
Home-Made Painting Art Materials
Quality in Ready-Made Artists' Supplies - Part I
Quality in Ready-Made Artists' Supplies - Part II
Quality in Ready-Made Artists' Supplies - Part III
Historical Notes on Art - Part I
Historical Notes on Art - Part II
Historical Notes on Art - Part III
Historical Notes on Art - Part IV
Historical Notes on Art - Part V
Tempera Painting
Oil Painting - Part I
Oil Painting - Part II
Oil Painting - Part III
Oil Painting - Part IV
Oil Painting - Part V
Oil Painting - Part VI
Pigments
Classification of Pigments - Part I
Classification of Pigments - Part II
Classification of Pigments - Part III
Pigments for Oil Painting
Pigments for Water Color
Pigments for Tempera Painting
Pigments for Pastel
Japanese Pigments
Pigments for Fresco Painting - Part I
Pigments for Fresco Painting - Part II
Selected Fresco Palette for Permanent Frescoes
Properties of Pigments in Common Use
Blue Pigments - Part I
Blue Pigments - Part II
Blue Pigments - Part III
There have been another one hundred and thirteen posts in a previous Art Resource series that have focused on the following topics:
(i) Units used in dyeing and printing of fabrics;
(ii) Occupational, health & safety issues in an art studio;
(iii) Color theories and color schemes;
(iv) Optical properties of fiber materials;
(v) General properties of fiber polymers and fibers - Part I to Part V;
(vi) Protein fibers;
(vii) Natural and man-made cellulosic fibers;
(viii) Fiber blends and melt spun fibers;
(ix) Fabric construction;
(x) Techniques and woven fibers;
(xi) Basic and figured weaves;
(xii) Pile, woven and knot pile fabrics;
(xiii) Nainkage, durable press and wash-wear finishes;
(xvi) Classification of dyes and dye blends;
(xv) The general theory of printing.
To access any of the above resources, please click on the following link - Units Used in Dyeing and Printing of Fabrics. This link will highlight all of the one hundred and thirteen posts in the previous a are eight data bases on this blogspot, namely, the Glossary of Cultural and Architectural Terms, Timelines of Fabrics, Dyes and Other Stuff, A Fashion Data Base, the Glossary of Colors, Dyes, Inks, Pigments and Resins, the Glossary of Fabrics, Fibers, Finishes, Garments and Yarns, Glossary of Art, Artists, Art Motifs and Art Movements, Glossary of Paper, Photography, Printing, Prints and Publication Terms and the Glossary of Scientific Terms. All data bases in the future will be updated from time-to-time.
If you find any post on this blog site useful, you can save it or copy and paste it into your own "Word" document for your future reference. For example, Safari allows you to save a post (e.g. click on "File", click on "Print" and release, click on "PDF" and then click on "Save As" and release - and a PDF should appear where you have stored it). Safari also allows you to mail a post to a friend (click on "File", and then point cursor to "Mail Contents On This Page" and release). Either way, this or other posts on this site may be a useful Art Resource for you.
The new Art Resource series will be the first post in each calendar month. Remember - these Art Resource posts span information that will be useful for a home hobbyist to that required by a final year University Fine-Art student and so undoubtedly, some parts of any Art Resource post may appear far too technical for your needs (skip those mind boggling parts) and in other parts, it may be too simplistic with respect to your level of knowledge (ditto the skip). The trade-off between these two extremes will mean that Art Resource posts will be hopefully useful in parts to most, but unfortunately may not be satisfying to all!
Oil Painting - Part III [1]
During the eighteenth century, and more so during the nineteenth, the knowledge and intelligent study of the methods and materials of painting fell into a sort of dark age, from which our contemporary painters have by no means entirely emerged. Good craftsmanship and a thorough knowledge of materials and methods continued to be of concern to some painters, but they were exceptions to the general trend.
The beginning of the era of great industrial and scientific development released artists from a number of details of labor indirectly essential to their work, so that they began to concentrate their efforts entirely on the planning, design and execution of their work, leaving the preparation of materials and other auxilliary work to specialists, upon who they eventually became thoroughly dependent.
The first effect of this development on the practice of painting techniques was to end the necessity of the artist learning the laborious hand or small-scale methods of manufacturing his/her own materials. Instead of giving the art student some degree of organized training in the principles underlying the properties and uses of materials as a substitute for the practical experience stressed in former times, the entire subject was eventually ignored.
Traditions relative to handling painting materials survived for some time, but inasmuch as these were passed on in terms of effect or "how," without regard for cause or "why," they soon degenerated to a set of fixed rules, and by the end of the nineteenth century we find few painters equipped with an intelligent understanding of the craft.
It was a short step from this attitude to the conviction that too great a concern with the fundamentals of technically correct practice would interfere with or hamper the free expression of artistic intention. The bulk of the work produced by men with this belief has become generally, in all artistic circles, the least valued from a technical viewpoint.
One of the first results was the general acceptance during the 1700s of the theory that the great masters of the past had mysteriously and closely guarded secrets through which they obtained the effects and permanence of their works. Many artists of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries seriously attempted to improve their craftsmanship by continual independent study and experiment, and they worked on their media until they attained fine control and the exact expression of their artistic intentions but failed to secure permanent results; a great many of these pictures have deteriorated within a comparatively short time. This can be attribued to misguided effort in search for the "secrets of the old masters."
It has been suggested that the word secrets as used in the medieval recipe books was not employed in the sense that such information was always jealously withheld. There is much evidence that such information was freely circulated among members of the craft, as it is today, and that it was not until more recent times, when this resurrected knowledge was not passed by the majority if it had a direct commercial or competitive value, and so was more jealously guarded.
Reference:
[1] The Artist's Handbook of Materials and Techniques, R. Mayer (ed. E. Smith) 4th Edition, Faber and Faber, London (1981).
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