Reverse painting and Gilding Behind Glass
by Frances Federer
The story of a nearly lost art, from the late Middle Ages to the First World War.
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| Detail, Adam and Eve in Paradise. Romania, 2nd half of the 19th century. 7" x 8". 20 cm x 18 cm. |
Introduction
I have recently seen some extraordinary examples of gilding on glass, and I would like in this article to discuss some aspects of the history and techniques of this art form.
The work I saw was in a catalogue published in Germany (details below) of an exhibition of Central European glass spanning the early 1500's to the late1600's. Central Europe includes the mountainous glass producing regions of Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Romania.
There was painted and gilded glass for jewelry, board-games tables, picture frames, devotional objects, drawer fronts, and reverse painting on glass, which reproduced easel paintings of the day. Styles and techniques varied; from engraved gold as in 'Verre Églomisé,' to 'faux' painting, using painted paper as collage, and 'faux' gilding, using lacquers and tin foil. There were landscapes, hunting scenes, scenes from the Old Testament, portraits and patterns.
Techniques
Sadly, I cannot hope adequately to illustrate the work for this article, apart from the two black and white examples, and this is not because of any shortcomings of the 'TIP.' Burnished water gilding behind glass, as on wood, reflects the light and the shadows. The additional layer of glass between the viewer and the image acts as a film, a fine veil. As you move, so the image moves; now you see it, now you don't. Photographs will show the design and maybe the colors, but not those ephemeral qualities that make the art unique. These qualities are enhanced when old glass is used, glass that has been rolled rather than floated. Floating is the modern method of glass manufacture and the dead flat results are not conducive to producing a sensuous, yielding image. With older glass, as you move your head and observe the broken reflections, the surface resembles rippling water. In all probability it is this aspect, once considered magical and mysterious in a superstitious age, that kept the art from being widely known, right up to, and beyond the invention of photography. It is a problem that contemporary practitioners like myself, still wrestle with.
This particular exhibition showed the very best of the genre, but there have been many other European exhibitions showing the more 'folksy' aspect of this work. There existed a huge industry producing vast numbers of painted and gilded panels for export all over the world, with a complex history from about the time of Columbus' discovery of America, 1492, and continuing up to the 1st World War, 1914.
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| Maria Immaculata, Augsburg.
2nd half of the 18th century. 19" x 22". 56 cm x 48 cm |
Terminology
The German term for the art is 'Hinterglasmalerei', painting behind glass. This embraces all aspects of cold painting and gilding behind glass, as opposed to painting on glass, and fusing the paints for permanence to the glass, in a kiln. The closest we can get in English to the German term is 'reverse painting on glass.' Frieder Ryser categorizes his collection with a term he has devised, and which does not appear in Cassells German Dictionary: 'amelieren.' He defines it as any painted or gilded decoration on the reverse side of glass that is bonded to the glass (not fired). He says the special characteristics of this work are its reflective qualities, derived from viewing the work through a panel of glass. He specifies that for this definition there should be NO SPACE at all between pigment, and/or engraved metal leaf, and the glass support. He has made the word from malen, to paint. It remains to be seen whether the opinions of this eminent scholar will influence the terminology of the art, in the long run.
The French have a term for the work, 'Fixés Sous Verres,' or 'fixés.' The French term many readers will be familiar with is 'Verre Églomisé,' taken from Jean-Baptiste Glomy, an 18th century Parisian antique dealer who devised ways of enhancing his prints and embroideries with glass matts painted black, with strips of gold paper for borders. The gold paper was later replaced with a water-gilded band, still popular with print dealers today. The term came into usage when dealers referred to such work as being 'Glomyised.' There is debate amongst students of the subject regarding this term. Many people do not like to use it as it is often misused. It really should apply only to those works incorporating engraved gold or silver leaf, unfired, on the glass, but the truth is that the term is becoming known and appearing, often inappropriately, in fashionable design magazines and do-it-yourself books. I have no problem with this; I would rather see the term misused in the public eye, than not at all. At least the expression becomes part of the language, reflecting an increased interest in the subject, and eventually curiosity will drive people to find out more about the subject.
Hinterglasmalerei remains a well-known, well researched activity in the German speaking world, but finding written material on the subject in English, or in French for that matter, as some readers may have already found, is a tough business.
Background History
The story starts in Augsburg, an important city in the Roman world. Nürnberg, its neighbor, was also important, with both centers, by the late 15th century, being known for fine cabinetwork, metalwork, all kinds of trades, and painting. In the Middle Ages in Europe the population lived mainly from the land, there were few towns or cities. As Rome was the seat of the Holy Roman Empire, which included most of Europe, a pilgrimage route developed that served in addition as a main thorough-fare for trade. Villages grew into towns and cities, as permits for trade were given, and regular markets allowed for the exchange of goods and ideas.
What we today call Germany consisted of more than 300 independent states, large and small. Amongst them were the 'Free Cities' of Augsburg and Nürnberg, each with special privileges and more freedom than other states. They had the liberty to run with new ideas, and run they did.
Both cities sat right on the trade route from Venice and the Adriatic to England and Holland in the North; as new designs arrived from Italy, they were adopted immediately. Objects such as silver ware, gold, jewelry, paintings and embroidery, together with countless printed designs would arrive, on their way north, and the German designers lost no time in absorbing these new conceptions and re-publishing them. The two cities had many brilliant goldsmiths and designers, in addition to the latest printing establishments, and became famous not so much for the spread of innovative design, as for the reproduction, by the hundreds, of 'new' designs. It is not only our age that is so attracted to the 'new.'
More on Technique
With no means of colored reproductions of fine paintings, the glass painter would take what was available to him, black and white prints from copperplate engravings and, laying a sheet of glass over one of these, trace the main outlines and early stages of the painting in water-color, with fine brushes. The painting was completed with pigments ground in oil, painting in reverse order. Highlights first, then foreground, middle ground and finally background. All lettering was in reverse, too. The reproduction work tended to use very little, if any, precious metals. For religious work, which constituted an enormous portion of reverse glass painting, outline patterns were made with painted black lines on thick white paper, and these were used over and over again. Metal leaf was commonly incorporated for cheap, mass produced icons, in imitation of the burnished backgrounds in traditional icons. For work of a better class, such as mentioned above, gold and silver leaf was used, in great part also for pieces with a religious purpose.
As I indicated earlier, there were many techniques. 'Verre Églomisé,' engraved gold leaf on glass, was but one. The Romans used this technique, finely engraving the leaf with metal needles using microscopic strokes. They protected the work with a layer of molten glass over the gold, fused to the first layer, but it was a tricky process that often damaged the gold and it was later abandoned.
In Central Europe gold was engraved either with the image showing positive or negative. That is, the gold was sometimes used for the background, with the motif scratched out, and sometimes the gold was scratched away from the background leaving only the motif in place. In both cases the gold was backed up with either oil paint or lacquers, to protect and color. In many cases, and this is where it gets really interesting, gold leaf was used not only as a color in itself, as in the case of icons, but placed behind thin paint, to reflect light back and to give extra depth to the picture. Very often tin foil was used for this purpose, either smooth or crinkled.
The German exhibition had examples of 'Faux' gilding. This was the practice of applying a gold-colored lacquer to the glass, and backing with tinfoil. And what was considered to be magnificently skilled reverse painting turns out also to be 'Faux,' regular painting on paper, cut out and applied to the glass as découpage, with genuine reverse painting and gilding around it. They were not above taking short cuts in the 16th century.
End of Part 1
Exhibition Catalogues and Very Abbreviated Bibliography:
Amalierte Stuck uff Glas/Hinder Glas gemalte Historien und Gemäld, Frieder Ryser, Brigitte Salmen, Schlossmuseum, Murnau, Germany, 1995
Reverse Paintings on Glass: The Ryser Collection, Corning Museum of Glass, Corning, New York 1992
Form and Decoration, Peter Thornton, Weidenfeld and Nicholson 1998
Images of Faith, Helen Waddy Lepovitz, University of Georgia Press 1991
World Mirrors, Graham Child, Sothebys, London, 1991
About the author:
Frances Binnington has been practicing, researching and teaching gilding on glass in England and the U.S. since the early eighties. She is London born, where she was a partner in an antique furniture restoration business whose clients included museums and private collectors. She is a member of the Society of Gilders and has been resident in the U.S. since 1992. If your curiosity is aroused, please visit her web-site at: www.gilding.net, e-mail her at: frances@gilding.net.
