Hi Forum,
I’m about to prepare a few untempered 9 x 12 x 1/8th thick” MDF panels with chalk gesso for some new paintings. While reading up on my procedure in Gottsegen he mentions that a chalk gesso ground can also be used for watercolours. Ha! I intuited that recently so it sounds interesting.
I’m already a big fan of 300 gr., hot pressed watercolor blocks, so I thought I might try it. It occured to me that glueing some thin cotton or linen fabric to the substrate before applying the gesso may add a slightly desirable tactile softness and absorbency to my watercolours. I have already experienced that softness with egg tempera – which in such cases was retrograde to my desire. For I find the crispest edges in ET are achieved on a gessoed ground applied directly to plywood or hard MDF.
Any comments or experience regarding the tactile quality or increased absorbency of painting watercolours on a rigid support covered with a chalk gesso ground?
Thanks, Koo. Yes, I’ve seen and experienced for myself that woodgrain telegraphs through. However, that is not the case for MDF, so I’ve switched to that for my rigid supports. Also MDF does not warp as easily as plywood, though in larger sizes both substrates always require bracing.
I usually use about 9 coats of TG so I don’t think that was the issue regarding the softness for the ET that I experienced. As I recall, though, it was probably on a surface where I had experimented with a collage of thicker fabrics. Most likely that caused it.
RE: Watercolor, besides working on hot pressed paper, I really like working wet-in-wet, where, by isolating wet and dry areas you can control your edges (at least) and then also softly modulate what happens within the wet area by selectively blotting. Your comments about the absorbency of TG accord with my experience (using ET, oil and encaustic). I may experiment with watercolour on a few MDF paneles – with or without a thin gluing of cloth over the substrate, just to see if it affects the wet-in-wet effects – or not.
Thanks again for your response.
Ellen
I’ve tried watercolor on “traditional gesso” (animal glue + chalk/gypsum ground) only a few times – so, I’m no expert in that respect – but I do have many years’ experience with egg tempera and metalpoint on traditional gesso (TG). TG is, overall, avery absorbent surface. By varying the ratio of glue to solid particles, you can somewhat vary TG’s absorbency: the higher the percentage of glue, the harder and slightly less absorbent the ground; the lower the percentage of glue (and correspondingly, the more solid particles) the more absorbent and somewhat less hard the surface is.
The degree of absorbency affects how readily the surface takes up water. For watercolor, if you have too much absorbency you won’t have much time to manipulate the paint. An artist can play with the degree of absorbency, to some degree, to figure out what works best both for the artist’s medium and working methods.
Traditional gesso is so absorbent that for some mediums – oil, for example – it takes up too much binder and the paint can be under bound; this is why it’s often recommended that oil painters who work on traditional gesso first cut the absorbency with a size of some sort (animal glue, shellac). Does the same holds true for watercolor, could the paint be under bound on a very absorbent TG surface? I don’t know – hopefully an experienced voice will comment.
I believe it’s critical to coat any surface that has wood grain (solid wood, plywood) with cloth (cotton or linen) before applying gesso – otherwise the grain pattern can telegraph through the gesso and create hairline cracks. I’ve seen this occur in paintings that are decades old; I’ve also seen it happen very quickly, on newly applied gesso, when a student used very water intensive methods. So I always apply cloth atop wood grain. Fiberboards, which don’t have a grain, don’t require cloth.
Perhaps you have a more sensitive touch than I, but after decades of working on traditional gesso I have never felt the tactile softness of the underlying cloth – my gessoed surfaces, both on MDF (no cloth) and plywood (linen), feel the same: absorbent, relatively hard, and amendable to crisply painted lines in egg tempera. How many coats of gesso did you apply? And what was the ratio of glue to solids (chalk)? I apply at least 9 layers or more, which fully covers the cloth, so there’s no hint of its presence. Perhaps that’s the difference.
Hope that helps, Koo Schadler
One more thing to mention….I don’t believe you need to use a traditional, artist’s portrait linen, which can be quite thick. Granted, a thick cloth would provide an optimally protective layer between wood grain and gesso – however I generally just use a fine linen from the fabric store: not too thick, tight weave, no knots – it works well to cover the grain yet is quickly filled in and fully covered by gesso.
Koo
Yes, a collage of fabric may have caused the softness. If you’re willing and able, please share what you learn about watercolor on traditional gesso – I’d be interested.
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