R&F Handmade Paints

Kingston HS class

Kingston High School, just a couple of blocks away from R&F, has a vibrant art department, due in large part to its inspired and dedicated teachers. They bring their students here for encaustic workshops, and the students are welcome to come back and work on their own in the workshop room.

Students in workshop room at R&F

Several years ago art teacher Lara Giordano partnered with chemistry teacher Christine Marmo to help make chemistry relevant to art students. Shuttling between science lab and studio room, the students learn the chemistry behind paper, pigments, dyes, paints, binders, metals, and clays, which gives them a deep material understanding of printmaking, papermaking, painting, photography, ceramics, jewelry making, art conservation, and chemical hazards in art. This understanding gives them life-long tools to master the various mediums.

Christine Marmo and Lara Giordano

The students gain a full understanding of color as they study electromagnetic radiation, prisms, and the refraction of white light into the different wavelengths of colors. In order to learn about papermaking, for example, they study the intermolecular forces of hydrogen bonding between cellulose and water. Soil chemistry relates to ceramics, acid-base and oxidation-reduction reactions relates to photography, and the study of the body – the vulnerability of the respiratory, circulatory, and nervous systems, as well as of skin and eyes – relates to understanding the chemical hazards of art materials.

I often wonder what such a class would have meant to me 45 years ago when I was a disaffected high school student flunking chemistry (and not much better in other subjects) but reading Max Doerner’s The Materials of the Artist to learn how to make egg tempera and explore the properties of oil paint. It would have made chemistry relevant to my obsession with art. It would have all made sense to me, and I would not have had to wait until I was making paint to finally appreciate the underlying science of making pictures.

When Lara and Christine asked me to give my talk on the chemistry and history of painting materials to their class, I was thrilled and intrigued by the challenge of simplifying this information for young artists. I’ve given this talk to professional artists and college students, but these kids don’t take second place in sophistication, and now and then I get questions that makes me pause.

The class was at 8:00 in the morning! (Who, after all, wants to learn chemistry at a reasonable hour?) The first day we explored what is color (how color is not a thing by itself but a chemical that reacts to light), the chemistry of pigments and dyes (what’s the difference?), the components of pigments (how, for example, cobalt blue is made from black cobalt oxide and silvery aluminum), and the history of pigments from ancient times to modern. All of this gets jammed into the 40-minute class period, so it’s just a sketch. But, still, we cover a lot of ground.

sample-jars

The second day we discussed different mediums and their relationship to pigments – how refraction and surface characteristics of the paint film affect the hue of a pigment. A pigment has a variety of hues and opacities depending on what medium it is in. Pigment in aqueous mediums (distemper, watercolor, egg tempera) is more opaque and lighter and brighter than pigment in oil or wax, which tends to be deeper and more translucent.

Richard showing blue

Cobalt blue pigment in different mediums

It’s a real challenge, but I love it every time I do it.

Ultramarine Blue Pigment

Ultramarine Blue has a fabled history. It is naturally derived from the semiprecious gemstone lapis lazuli. It gets its name from the Latin, meaning beyond the sea, since the best source of lapis was in the northeastern corner what is now Afghanistan. (more…)

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George Mason is an artist from Nobleboro, ME with a long history of painting encaustic onto plaster. This month, he came down to Kingston for a week to experiment in our workshop with encaustic monotype.  Image 1

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George came here loaded with elaborate and delicate stencils that he had drawn freehand and cut out in his studio. The stencils were part of a repeating monotype process, creating an interplay between encaustic’s molten chaos, the stencils’ rigid patterns, the absorbency of the paper, and ghost images from previous pulls. Image 2

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His first step is to lay a color on the palette. Image 3

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The stencil is laid over that.  Image 4

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A sheet built up with the paint from unsuccessful pulls is reutilized by laying face-down over the stencil. Newsprint is laid over this and burnished with matboard shims and the blotter is pulled. Image 5

The palette now has the layer of white, the stencil, and the color from the blotter. A sheet of Arches Text is laid on the ghost. Image 7

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The paper absorbs the color.  Image 8

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The palette is wiped clean and Egyptian violet is applied. Image 9

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The previous print is laid face-up, allowing the violet underneath to soak up like a slowly developing photo negative. Image 10, 11 & 12

George plays with endless variations on this process. Different papers create different effects. He particularly likes the way the metallic colors work in the monotypes, partially separating out from the wax and bunching up in ways that look to him like ice floating on water.

Learn more about George’s work at: www.georgemasonart.com

Interested in learning about Monotypes, click here to find out about our Visting Artist Workshop with Monotype expert Paula Roland.

"Piri's Voyage" / encaustic and pigment on paper / 30" x 40" / 2009

Join us for the opening of Sara Mast, “Excavating Wonder”, on Saturday June 13th from 5-7pm.  Sara will be traveling all the way from Bozeman, Montana to give an artist talk at 5pm.

The paintings of Sara Mast explore a remote view of the world, as if seen through the technological eye of a satellite, or high-powered telescope. Masts’ work is wholly imagined, yet appropriates a range of scientifically accurate data from star charts to magnetic resonance images of neuronal dendrites. Elements of ancient languages intermingle with navigational artifacts of both sky and sea. The artist embeds layers of information that are revealed as if seen through geologic or archaeological strata. In Masts’ work, flecks of naturally pigmented wax gather and dissolve in forms that reference landmasses, clouds or cosmic dust and stars, expanding and contracting like living organisms.  For more information or to view more of Sara’s work, click here.

R&F is excited to be attending the Third Annual Encaustic Painting Conference at Montserrat College of Art.  With 3 days of vendors, demonstrations, lectures, and over 200 attendees, all will be a buzz.

So stop by our vendor booth and say hello to Darin and Anne.  In addition to special conference prices, there will be special colors: Aquamarine Blue, Stil de Grain and Blood Orange.

R&F President Richard Frumess will be giving a lecture entitled What is Paint?  Instructor Danielle Correia will be demonstrating on Photograhy and Encaustic and Instructor Cynthia Winika will be demonstrating on Paper and Encaustic.

The conference runs Friday June 6th - Sunday June 8th.  This is sure to be the encaustic event of the year so don’t miss out.

Christine Marmo

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