Reverse painting and Gilding Behind Glass
by Frances Federer
The use of gold, silver and imitation metal leaf in reverse glass painting.
Part III
Walking through the one and a half rooms of Hinterglasmalerei at the museum it appeared at first sight that very little use was made of precious leaf. A closer look told a very different story, one that taught me more about these techniques, and one that told me once again not to make assumptions. Hinterglasmalerei means reverse glass painting, and the museum was the Schlossmuseum in Murnau, Bavaria, in Southern Germany. Half of one room displayed a history of the techniques of unfired painting and gilding behind glass, with a concentration on Murnau and district, and the main room displayed a selection of an enormous collection of work (courtesy Udo Dammert) from around the world, from the 16th century to the present day.
Murnau was the center of the rural glass painting business in Central Europe from around 1680, until the advent of lithography, roughly two hundred years later. I have written about the development of the art in this part of the world in previous articles, but here I will describe quite briefly a variety of techniques, applicable just as much today as are traditional signwriting techniques.
Verre Églomisé: Usually the gilding is the first operation. The design is then engraved, removing the gold with a sharpened stick, excess gold removed and the whole painted.
Method: Mark areas to be gilded with felt tip pen on the FRONT of the glass. All the work is now carried out on the BACK. Lay the gold leaf using gelatine size in the form of capsules, sheet, or powder. Burnish when dry, and engrave with a stick, sharpened ivory, bone or a pencil. Back up with oil based paints. That is the basic technique.
Here is some extra information that may help interested students:
Traditional method for making a pattern from a copperplate engraving.
A sheet of glass was laid over the print, and the contours painted with black oil-based paints. While the paint was still wet, a sheet of white paper was laid across the paint and lifted off. When dry this sheet of paper can be used repeatedly as a pattern. Alternatively, tracing paper could be laid over the engraving, the contours drawn in pencil, the tracing paper laid over a sheet of strong, white paper, the lines pricked with a stylus, tracing paper discarded and the lines painted in black on the white paper. Once the pattern was on the white paper, it was simply placed beneath the clear glass panel that was going to be the support for the painting, and the black lines transferred onto the glass, with water color. From then on oil color would be used.
Transferring a design for verre églomisé: If you make your own drawing, and this is preferable, try to find carbon paper that works on gold. If you cannot, take tracing paper and trace your design. Prick the traced contours, place over the gilded glass, and with a sharp metal point scratch sufficiently into the gold, later joining up the scratches. Work on a small area at a time. Practice makes perfect, and also teaches you your own favorite techniques.
Back up: Usually with oil-based paints. Oil keys better to the glass. Back up paints can be opaque, or transparent. Sign writers use paint that is heavy in pigment and short on oil which has the advantage of drying very fast, but is so soft that protection with a good varnish is imperative. Sign writers matte paint, known as Ronan Japan, USA, or Bolloms (formerly Keeps) paint, UK. You can add some varnish to increase transparency.
Water Gilding over this oil painted surface will not work well with a water-based size as the surface will now be very uneven, and the water will be repelled by the paint surface. A non greasy vitreous, or extremely polished surface is needed to adhere metal leaf this way. But after at least two good coats of varnish, and if you can break the surface tension with some detergent in the water, it is possible to water gild. Otherwise satisfactory choices for mordants for gold, silver and metal of any variety are oil-based gold size, with or without the addition of Japan gold size, or acrylic size.
Reversibility is important, not just from the conservation angle, but for those who are creating new work, and may well wish to change his/her mind as the piece progresses. Once dry, though, changing one layer without disturbing the previous one will not always be possible, especially with acrylics.
Shellac can be used to isolate one medium from another, or to stabilize a delicate paint layer. To color, add aniline dyes, wetting the powder with a little alcohol first. Shellac on glass is not a particularly simple process, so you need to learn well about your materials or find a teacher. DANGER POINT: Do not breathe the aniline powder, it is highly toxic. Shellac gives marvelous deep, transparent glazes, which are enhanced by gilding with precious metal leaf or with imitation, simulating transmitted light. Advantage: reversible with alcohol, after drying, leaving previous paint layers unharmed, IF you are careful. WATCHPOINT: abrasion will remove anything, even if you use the 'right' solvents.
Observations from the museums at Murnau, and at Oberammergau.
As I said at the opening of this piece, it seemed at first glance, with the exception of the verre églomisé examples, that very little leaf or silvering was used in combination with Hinterglasmalerei. A more careful examination, though, revealed quite a generous sprinkling of leaf in general, and a good deal of silvering in particular, carried out behind painting. I had already seen the catalogue for this exhibition, but had not realized that many examples of painting were backed with mirror. The mirror had been photographed as a light grey, which I had assumed was paint, neglecting to read the captions carefully. In addition, gold does not show particularly well in pictures, but tarnished leaf, either silver or Dutch metal, can be impossible to recognize. When I came to walk through the gallery it was a pleasant surprise to discover the group of mirrored paintings, but also very interesting to see so much evidence of leaf in its various forms. However, in many cases the leaf was so disfigured and dark I could sometimes hardly distinguish it, even then.
The Augsburg glass paintings, made for export from the 1750's until the 1790's, were reproductions of oils on canvas, and no leaf was used. It appeared to be the tradition to decorate frames for these pictures, with let-in strips of mirrored glass, the joints being covered with shaped, glazed, pressed tin. The effects of these, and all reflective surfaces cannot be appreciated in photographs, as reflection would distract from the painting, whereas in actuality our slightest movement registers in the mirror and gives LIFE to the whole piece.
In the mid 18th century Eastern Bavaria glass workers were encouraged to emigrate south, to within the Hapsburg Empire, in order to avoid duties on their exports. Many grinders, polishers and etchers had already made the move, but by 1775 these skills, together with brilliant cutting, had all but disappeared, leaving only painting on glass as a surviving trade. For this reason the painted mirrors made during this time, incorporating brilliant cutting, gilding and silvering represent a stepping stone in the history of Eastern Bavarian glass painters. Examples in the exhibition come from Raimundreuth, Aussergefild and Buchers. Brilliant cutting into the back of the glass gave extra depth and interest to the mirrored surface, while in many cases no silvering was done, but the ground and polished areas were oil gilt before painting.
A well painted pair of portraits of the Prince and Princess of Prussia from 1800 makes use of the combination of paint with silvering, at that date still the mercury and tin process, but in this case unfortunately much of the paint had been damaged. All the painting will have been done first, followed by the silvering This last, not a particularly gentle process, probably broke through the finer painted lines causing the losses.
Notes on the techniques using paint with silvering, gold and metal leaf
From Udo Dammerts' collection from around the world I will look at specific examples of the use of gold leaf, metal leaf or gold powder in their glass pictures.
Southern Italy. In the mid 1800's, examples show extensive outlining with a metal powder in a vehicle of some sort. Otherwise I saw no leaf. An example from Spain, from the 1850's, showed a painted black pattern leaving clear areas for Dutch metal. In other cases a glaze was painted first onto the glass, prior to the laying of leaf, which appeared to be crinkled, tarnished and de-laminating. This situation to a greater or lesser extent was common to much of the work on show. In addition, one of the Spanish pieces showed the technique of scraping through the thin, wet paint with a stick, with metal leaf laid behind. Like many pieces in the collection, these glass paintings were a commercial proposition, carried out extremely fast by teams of workers who had little or no artistic input into the process. The metal, in some cases, looks as if it was thrown on, held in place by a wing and a prayer.
From Franken, one of the German Principalities, from the 1750's to 1800, an interesting technique was used with gold leaf behind paint. This was a kind of 'reverse verre églomisé' technique. Paint was applied, in this case only one color, a Van Dyke brown. It was applied carefully in places, and in other places right across the glass. Everything that was to be gold was scratched away, using a variety of tools for a variety of lines. Then gold was applied across the entire back, not Dutch metal. I imagine the design was transferred by scratching through the holes of a punctured pattern. Without close examination and tests I cannot tell what the mordant was.
Silesia, early 1800's. Dutch metal used as another color. Outlines of yellow, with a little brown or green glaze.
Sandl, Moravia. Same as above, but with red, or black outlines.
Rumania, Banat, Serbia. Black outlines give this work their characteristic Byzantine look. The most tarnished Dutch metal I have found is on work from this region. Some of the work is reasonably tight, but some of it is very sloppy, with the outlines being generally followed with paint, leaving spaces for the leaf.
Ukraine, extremely crude, with untarnished metal that looks like the cheapest, nastiest chocolate wrapping. No painting beforehand to mitigate its gaudy effect. Yet, amazingly, in one example, the overall effect was one of strong personality, brimming with brazen, masculine confidence (it was a picture of a male). I am reminded at the Oberammergau Heimatmuseum, which holds some 1200 examples of local productions only, of the enormous output of these items, and of the inevitability of compromise of quality over quantity.
China 18th century. These are by far the finest painting on glass that have ever been produced. Responding to Western demand for all things Oriental, painting production lines were here, too, set up for maximum profit. Closely following Western engravings, such as those made by the explorer Carl Gustav Ekeberg (1716-1784)1 The Magazine Antiques, March 1998 paintings were produced on canvas, porcelain and paper, in addition to glass. Ekeberg made accurate engravings of views of the Pearl river, with its Western factories built on its banks and where the city of Canton, the only trading port with the West, was situated. These were faithfully copied until the western manner of painting was thoroughly integrated by the Chinese and they were able to adapt and alter their pictures as they chose. They also produced numerous portraits and domestic scenes on glass. From Europe mirrors were exported to China from which the silvering was carefully scratched away to create spaces for painting. Water was often represented, as was sky, by mirror.
Examples in the exhibition showed paintings that were finely outlined with two colors of bronze powder, white gold and what we refer to now as 'moon' gold, a light bronze color. At the same time all the decoration on fabrics was beautifully painted with flowers and ornamentation such as appears in their conventional painting. Backing up then was with solid colors, and black.
1 Carl Gustav Ekeberg and the Invention of Chinese Export Painting by Kee Il Choi Jr.
End of Part 3
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.
