Outlines the techniques that are currently employed to analyze the synthetic resins used in modern painting materials, such as pyrolysis-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and direct temperature-resolved mass spectrometry. For each technique, results are given for standard samples of the principal classes of synthetic binding media, various pigments and extenders, tube paint formulations, and microscopic paint fragments taken from actual works of art.
Examines the application of scientific methods to the study and conservation of art and cultural properties. This work addresses scientific topics of broad interest, cutting across the boundaries of traditional disciplines and attracting up to 250 leadingresearchers in the field.
The versatility of modern commercial house paints has ensured their use in a broad range of applications, including the protection and decoration of historic buildings, the coating of toys and furniture, and the creation of works of art. Historically, house paints were based on naturally occurring oils, gums, resins, and proteins, but in the early twentieth century, the introduction of synthetic resins revolutionized the industry. Good quality ready-mixed products became available and were used by artists worldwide. While the ubiquity of commercial paints means that conservators are increasingly called upon to preserve them, such paints pose unique challenges including establishing exactly which materials are present. This book traces the history of the household paint industry in the United States and United Kingdom over the first half of the twentieth century. It includes chapters on the artistic use of commercial paints and the development of ready-mixed paints and synthetic resins; oil paints, oleoresinous gloss and enamel paints, water paints, nitrocellulose lacquers, oil-modified alkyds, and emulsion paints; and the conservation implications of these materials. The book will be of interest to conservators and conservation scientists working on a broad range of painted surfaces, as well as curators, art historians, and historians of architectural paint.
The next title in the respected Artist’s Materials series offers groundbreaking analysis of Sam Francis’s working methods and materials American artist Sam Francis (1923–1994) brought vivid color and emotional intensity to Abstract Expressionism. He was described as the “most sensuous and sensitive painter of his generation” by former Guggenheim Museum director James Johnson Sweeney, and curator Howard Fox called him “one of the acknowledged masters of late-modern art.” Francis’s works, whether intimate or monumental in scale, make indelible impressions; the intention of the artist was to make them felt as much as seen. At the age of twenty, Francis was hospitalized for spinal tuberculosis and spent three years virtually immobilized in a body cast. For physical therapy he was given a set of watercolors, and, as he described it, he painted his way back to life. The exuberant color and expression in his paintings celebrated his survival; his five-decade career was an energetic visual and theoretical exploration that took him around the world. Francis’s idiosyncratic painting practices have long been the subject of speculation and debate among conservators and art historians. Presented here for the first time in this volume are the results of an in-depth scientific study of more than forty paintings from the late 1940s to early 1990s, which reveal new discoveries about his creative process, inventive techniques, and specially formulated paints and binders. The data provides a key to the complicated evolution of the artist’s work and informs original art historical interpretations.
Bridging the fields of conservation, art history, and museum curating, this volume contains the principal papers from an international symposium titled "Historical Painting Techniques, Materials, and Studio Practice" at the University of Leiden in Amsterdam, Netherlands, from June 26 to 29, 1995. The symposium—designed for art historians, conservators, conservation scientists, and museum curators worldwide—was organized by the Department of Art History at the University of Leiden and the Art History Department of the Central Research Laboratory for Objects of Art and Science in Amsterdam. Twenty-five contributors representing museums and conservation institutions throughout the world provide recent research on historical painting techniques, including wall painting and polychrome sculpture. Topics cover the latest art historical research and scientific analyses of original techniques and materials, as well as historical sources, such as medieval treatises and descriptions of painting techniques in historical literature. Chapters include the painting methods of Rembrandt and Vermeer, Dutch 17th-century landscape painting, wall paintings in English churches, Chinese paintings on paper and canvas, and Tibetan thangkas. Color plates and black-and-white photographs illustrate works from the Middle Ages to the 20th century.
The market demands modern, high-performance, flawless paints that possess specified properties. Where deviations from set points occur, the cause must be investigated and the error must be remedied. What "standard methods" don't disclose is why a particular coating either meets or fails to meet a requirement. Thus the author presents modern analytical techniques and their applications in the coatings industry that answer further complex questions. The information in this book can be used for performing failure analysis, production control and quality control, and also meet the requirements of modern high-level quality management. An excellent combination of theory and practice for formulators, paint engineers and applied technologists seeking a sound basic introduction to instrumental paint analysis and concrete answers to everyday problems.
This book provides the first comprehensive overview of the techniques and materials used in a range of monumental paintings from the Late Classical to the Graeco-Roman period reflecting the Hellenistic culture. Based primarily on the technical examination and analyses of wall paintings, painted architectural elements and marble monuments, the scientific study of materials provides information on the chemical composition of the plasters, the nature of pigments and their microstructure and identifies patterns of trade and methods of manufacture (if synthesised). The results suggest a highly developed and cosmopolitan culture, encompassing the entire Mediterranean region and beyond, from the mountains of Macedonia to the deserts of Ptolemaic Egypt and the Eurasian Plateau, throughout which ideas and goods flowed freely.
