The second lecture looked at the evolution in the nature of binders, their drying principles and the consequences for the appearance of works. The interaction between a painted work and light is strongly conditioned by the nature of the technique used to produce it. Throughout history, it is possible to distinguish between practices involving an organic binder based on oil, animal glue, egg, wax or gum, and those involving the fixing of colors onto a fresh lime-based mineral plaster. The paintings of the metopes in the tomb of the young girl with the swing discovered in the Cyrene region (Libya), preserved in the Louvre Museum and dated to the late 3rd or early 2ndcentury BC, demonstrate a strong awareness of this variety of processes. In this case, the Cyrene artist combined two techniques: on the one hand, fresco and lime-bonded paint, used to decorate architectural elements and achieve subtle skin tones, and, on the other, encaustic paint, preferred for painting jewelry, hair or clothing. It's likely that the painter sought more luminous effects with an abundance of beeswax binder. Such practices seem to have already existed in Pharaonic Egypt, as attested by analyses of the bust of Nefertiti in the Egyptian Museum in Berlin. Oil painting would later enhance these effects. In 1568, Giorgio Vasari explained that "this process exalts colors: it requires only care and love, because oil has in itself the property of making color softer, softer, more delicate, easier to tune and to fade [1]"
10:30 - 11:30
Lecture
Formulating materials to create new artistic effects
Philippe Walter
10:30 - 11:30
