Cyclopedia of Painting/Painting in Distemper

by George D. Armstrong

PAINTING IN DISTEMPER.

This mode of coloring, which, when applied to fine art purposes, is termed tempera painting, is undoubtedly the most ancient, and derives its name from the fact that colors are mixed or tempered with some liquid or medium to bind their separate particles to each other, and to the surface on which the paint is applied.

The Italian noun tempera admits of the widest application, and would include any medium, even oil; but, in its restricted and proper acceptation, it means a vehicle in which the yolk of egg, beaten sometimes with the white, is the chief ingredient, diluted as required with the milky juices expressed from the shoots of the fig-tree. This is the painting strictly termed a nuovo by the Italians. Vinegar probably replaced the fig-tree juice among the northern artists, from the difficulty of obtaining the latter, and in modern use vinegar is substituted. Vinegar should be used to prevent the putrefaction of the yolk of egg, but the early Italian painters preferred the egg vehicle when it had been suffered to stand until it had become decomposed, hence the phrase "a putrido."

The artist is often compelled to have recourse to very offensive media to make known his most refined revelations. On walls, and for coarser work, such as painting on linen, warm size was occasionally used, but the egg vehicle, undiluted, was generally preferred for altar-pieces on wood. For various purposes, and at different periods, however, milk, beer, wine and media composed of water, and more or less glutinous ingredients, soluble at first in water, such as gums, have also been used. Such are the media or vehicles described by the chief Italian writers, as used in the days of Cimabue, Giotto and Fra Angelico, and by the early painters before the invention and improvement of oil painting. The finer egg tempera in dry climates has been found to attain so firm a consistence as to withstand ordinary solvents. The use of wine in diluting these glutinous vehicles was common for a long period. Buffalmacco, of whom so many humorous stories are told by Boccaccio and Vasari, is related to have persuaded some nuns, for whom he painted, to supply him with their choicest wine, ostensibly for the purpose of diluting the colors, but really to be imbibed by the thirsty painter himself. The northern artists were sometimes compelled to content themselves with beer. In the works of the northern tempera painters there are, however, very marked differences observable in the impasto or body of colors. It is certain, therefore, that these painters employed media of different degrees of consistence. In the distemper of scene-painting, the medium is weak size of glue, but plaster of paris, sufficiently diluted, is worked with the colors. The carbonate of lime, or whiting, is less active as a basis for colors than the pure lime of fresco, but it is entirely destructive of transparency. When the more viscid media were employed by the tempera painters, the effect must, with their purer use of the colors, some of which were, moreover, transparent, have been very lustrous and powerful in comparison with modern scene-painters' distemper, and these qualities were heightened by the addition of a strong varnish; still, however, tempera fell far short of oil painting in richness and transparency.

The carbonate of lime, or whiting, employed as a basis is, however, less active than the pure lime of fresco. The vehicles of both modes are the same, and their practice is often combined in the same work. Water is their common vehicle, and to give adhesion to the tints and colors in distemper painting, and make them keep their place, they are variously mixed with the size of glue, prepared commonly by dissolving about 4 ounces of glue in a gallon of water. Too much of the glue disposes the painting to crack and peel from the ground, while with too little it is friable and deficient of strength. In some cases glue may be abated, or altogether dispensed with, by employing plaster of paris sufficiently diluted and worked into the colors, by which they will acquire the consistency and appearance of oil painting, without employing their limpidness or allowing the colors to separate, while they will acquire a good surface, and keep their place in the dry with the strength of fresco, and without being liable to mildew, to which animal glue is disposed, and to which milk, and other vehicles recommended in this mode, are also subject.

There can be no doubt that distempering has its manifold advantages, and that when well done it possesses a degree of clearness and brightness, especially in white, pink, blue and lilac, which is not attainable in oil colors, owing to the admixture of the various oils, and to the changes likely to occur in them subsequent to the application of the colors.

A fruitful cause of failure in distemper work is the neglect of proper precaution in preparing the surfaces to be colored, the great point at starting, assuming that the wall has been well smoothed, or if necessary scraped, in order that the surface may present no roughness or inequalities whatever. The first stage is but seldom attended to by painters, who assume that the plasterer, as a matter of course, leaves the wall properly finished, but this must not always be taken for granted. At all events even if the work has been carried as far as it is the plasterer's duty to take it, there is no reason why the next stage should not be considered to belong to the painter, who is so well aware of the conditions on which a good result to his work depends.

The process consists in this, the plasterers having left the walls, the painters take them in hand. With a bucket of water, a sponge, a rag, and a slab of wood, 6 inches broad and 7 or 8 inches long, on the back of which a handle made of leather is placed, and it must be mentioned that the wood is cut crosswise, each board being, as it were, a slice of a tree. The workman wets the wall with his sponge, and applies his wood brush, for this the instrument practically becomes, since the ends of the fibers, directed towards the wall, act like so many closely packed hairs.

The wood brush is rapidly worked in a circular direction, the wall being kept moistened with the sponge, and finally the surface is washed clean and well rubbed with the cloth, and then allowed to become thoroughly dry. A smooth surface is thus produced, and the next process is to stop the absorbent properties of the plaster, and here the process ends. The mixture used in this country is thoroughly well adapted for its purpose, and is compounded in the following manner:

Saturate about 12 pounds of best whiting with water, and beat it up, with a constant addition of water, until the mixture assumes the consistency of a soft paste. Add sufficient size to bind the color, 2 ounces of alum and 2 ounces of soft soap, each dissolved in water. Mix all these ingredients thoroughly well, and strain through a coarse cloth or metal strainer. Care should be taken that too much size is not used, in fact, rather than use the mixture altogether too strong, it is preferable to give two coats of medium consistency, which, in effect, are better than a single thick one. If the wall is known to be damp, no amount of care, and no application on the one side of a wall, will keep it dry if it is pervious to moisture on the other or from below. The source of the evil must be sought for, and efforts should, in the first place, be applied to the removal of the cause rather than to ameliorating the injurious effects.

The first and most general application of distempering is the process known as calcimining. In commencing to calcimine, the walls should be prepared as described above, but, of course, if they have been colored before, they will merely require washing with clean water, scraping smooth the rough patches, the cracks being stopped and made good, the whole being then passed over with the wood brush. Care should be taken that all the scrapings and other debris are swept away before the walls are finally rubbed down with a cloth and the coloring is commenced. The calcimine is made by mixing whiting, which has previously been allowed to soak for twelve or fourteen hours in water, to about the consistency of cream, care being observed that the mixture is very smooth. One teacupful of size is then to be added to two gallons of the whitewash, or, if a perfectly white wash is required, potato starch may be used. In laying on the wash, a large flat brush is employed, and, if this is not overcharged, a ceiling or walls may, with a certain amount of care, be white or color washed with little or no splashing.

The following mixture will be found useful for common work: ¹⁄₂ bushel of lime, 1 pound common salt, ¹⁄₂ pound of sulphate of zinc, and 1 gallon of sweet milk.

For brickwork exposed to damp: ¹⁄₂ peck of fresh well-burnt lime, with water sufficient to make it into a thin paste, pass through a fine sieve, add a gallon of clear salt which has been dissolved in boiling water. Make a thin paste of 1 pound of rice flour and ¹⁄₄ pound of best glue, mix this paste, whilst hot, with the previously made compound, and add ¹⁄₄ pound of Spanish whiting dissolved in 1 quart of water. Stir all well together, cover over, and let the whole stand for a week, when it is to be applied whilst quite hot.

In order to produce good work, two things are essentially necessary in the mixing of the distemper, namely, clean and well-washed whiting and pure-jellied size. The whiting should be put in to soak with sufficient soft water to cover it well and penetrate its bulk. When the whiting is sufficiently soaked, the water should be poured off, which will remove any rust or foreign matter from the whiting, it should then be beaten up or stirred until all the lumps are broken, and it becomes a stiff, smooth paste. A good workman will do this carefully with his hand, and will manipulate it until it is quite smooth, but it may be done most effectually with a broad stick or spatula, and then strained through a metal or other strainer. The size should now be added, and the two lightly but effectually mixed together. Care should be taken not to break the jelly of the size any more than can be avoided, and this may be best done by gently stirring the mixture with the hand. If the jellied state is retained intact, the color will work cool, and lay on smooth and level. The size, whether made of parchment clippings, glue, or any other material, should be dissolved in a sufficient quantity of water to form a weak jelly when cold. In practice we find that distemper mixed with jellied size will lay on better and make a better job than when the size is used hot. Color mixed on the former plan works cool and floats nicely, while the latter works dry, and drags and gathers, thus making a rough ceiling or wall, and the difference in the labor required is very much in favor of jellied size. A little alum added to the distemper has a good effect in hardening, and helps it to dry out solid and even.

In distemper painting, or, as it is more frequently called, calcimining, the base generally used for all the tints is the finest whiting, which is prepared in large quantities by various manufacturers. All the colors should either be ground very fine, or should be washed over, so as to ensure the most minute division of their particles.

It will require two coats, and sometimes more, of any of the tints to cover plaster well, and to bear out with absolute uniformity. When old plastering has become disfigured by stains, it is necessary, in the first place, to properly scrape and prepare the wall, and then to give it one or two coats of white lead ground in oil, the second being mixed with an additional quantity of turpentine, this, if well and sufficiently done, will cover all the stains, and will take the size colors very kindly.

In order to produce an absolutely level tint in distemper, great care should be exercised in carrying on the work. Whilst the color is being laid on, the windows and doors should be closed, and all draughts prevented, so that the wash may not dry too quickly, in which case the brush drags, and all piecings or brush marks will show when quite dry, but the moment the work is finished, all windows and doors are to be opened, in order to afford free ingress to the fresh air, for the moment the whole of the color is laid on, the sooner it dries the better. In order to ensure uniformity in drying, and to avoid parts becoming shady, the wash must be laid on evenly, and when the ground is once covered, no portion of it should be retouched, for such portion would then receive an additional coat, and would without fail present a more solid and brighter appearance than the rest, at the same time there is every chance that the brush, passing over the half-dry or partially set color underneath, would rub up some of it, and cause a rough appearance, whilst the edges of the retouched part would be visible, giving the idea of a patch having been applied over the spot.

The colors of which the various tints are to be composed should be ground up separately, and should be carefully added to the white body. As far as can be calculated, as much of any particular tint as may be required for one room or job should be compounded at once, to avoid the trouble of matching. Powder color should never be added to the body white If only a small quantity of any additional color is required, it should be well ground on a slab, and taken on the point of the palette knife, or at the end of a stick, and thus mixed with the general mass. Where this is not done, the white gathers around each separate particle of the powder color, making a minute ball, with a colored center and as it were a white shell, a number of these become agglutinated. The inexperienced workman thinks the color is well mixed, because he has, during mixing, lost sight of the particles of color, but when he comes to spread the wash on the wall, the dark specks emerge from their temporary cases, and, as they are dragged along by the brush, cause lines and streaks of more or less breadth, according to the number of particles which have been bound together. These may not perhaps be noticed whilst the color is wet, but will son appear as it dries, and the evil result will not be in appearance only, for as these specks of color have not been bound by the size with which the whole mass has been mixed, the spots and streaks caused by them will rub off, leaving the original color of the plaster, or of the previous wash, visible. Sometimes, too, when the powder color is of a heavier character than the mass, it finds its way to the bottom of the bucket or pot, and when the quantity is nearly used, the last part of it will be found to become gradually darker than that previously used, whilst if the brush be allowed to touch the bottom, it will bring up a quantity of dark color which will be deposited with the first stroke on the wall.

Great care must be taken in mixing tints, for some colors, such as Prussian blue, are so strong that a very little of them will produce the desired effect, and thus, if they are used without consideration, it becomes necessary to add more and more white, a greater quantity of the tint required is compounded, and waste results. The safer plan is to mix a small quantity of the tint in a jar or on a piece of glass, and, having spread this on a piece of paper, the painter will be able, when it is dry, to judge of the shade, and to form an idea as to the relative qualities of the different colors required. Other colors again, such as orange lead, are of such density, that they will separate from the others and sink to the bottom, and therefore tints compounded with these must be worked in a size jelly, this, too, will be learnt by trial and experience.

Nearly all of the colors given herewith may be used in either oil or distemper painting, the white, in the one case, being white lead, diluted with oil and turpentine, and, in the other, whiting mixed with size.

STRAW COLOR.

• White lead, Massicot (in oil).
• Whiting, Dutch pink (in distemper).
• Whiting, Chrome yellow.

LAVENDER, LILAC, AND FRENCH GRAYS.

Produced according to the predominance of white, blue or red.

• White, Lake, Indigo.
• White," Lake, Prussian blue.
• White," Indian Red, Prussian blue.
• White," Vermilion, Prussian blue.
• White," Indigo, Rose pink.

PEARL GRAY.

• White, Black, Prussian blue.

GRAY TINTS. (Of a blue hue.)

• White, Verditer.
• White," Blue black.
• White," Lamp black.
• White," Indigo.

GRAY TINTS. (Of a brown hue.)

• White, Madder brown, Prussian blue.
• White," Madder brown, Prussian blue, Yellow ochre.
• White," Indian red, Indigo.
• White," Light red, Prussian blue.
• White," Burnt sienna, Lake, Indigo.

BROWN TINTS.

• White, Lake, Prussian blue, Yellow ochre.
• White," Lake, Indigo, Yellow ochre.
• White," Raw sienna, Madder lake, Prussian blue.
• White," Light red, Indigo.
• White," Vandyke brown. Lake, Indigo.
• White," Burnt sienna. Indigo.
• White," Burnt sienna, Lake.

GREEN TINTS.

• White, Italian pink, Antwerp blue.
• White," Italian pink, Prussian blue.
• White," Yellow ochre. Indigo.
• White," Burnt sienna. Indigo.
• White," Brown pink. Indigo.
• White," Raw umber, Indigo.

PEA GREEN.

• White, French green.
• White," Olympian green.
• White," Brunswick green.
• White," Prussian blue. Chrome yellow.

SAGE GREEN.

• White, Prussian blue. Raw umber.
• White," Antwerp blue, Stone ochre.

OLIVE GREEN.

• White, Raw umber, Prussian blue.

ORANGE TINTS.

• White, French yellow.
• White," Orange lead.
• White," Dutch pink.
• White," Chrome yellow, Vermilion.

PINK TINTS.

• White, Rose pink.
• White," Crimson lake.
• White," Scarlet lake.

SALMON COLOR.

• White, Venetian red.
• White," Vermilion.

PEACH TINTS.

• White, Vermilion, Indian red, Purple brown.
• White," Vermilion, Indian red, Purple brown, Burnt stone ochre.

VIOLET TINTS.

• White, Vermilion, Prussian blue, Lamp black.

CHOCOLATE.

• White, Spanish brown, Venetian red, Vegetable black.

SKY BLUE.

• White, Prussian blue.

FLESH TINT.

• White, Light red, Yellow ochre.
• White," Lake, Vermilion, Naples yellow.

FAWN.

• White, Burnt sienna.
• White," Burnt umber, Venetian red
• White," Stone ochre, Vermilion,

BUFF.

• White, Yellow ochre, Venetian red.
• Cream-color is produced by a great preponderance of white.

DRAB AND STONE COLOR.

• White, Burnt umber.
• White," Raw umber.
• White," Yellow ochre.
• White," Yellow ochre, Lamp black.
• White," Raw umber, Lamp black.

LEAD COLOR.

• White, Black.
• White," Black, Indigo.

It must of course be understood that the colors are not to be mixed in equal quantities, but in such proportions as will produce the required hue, the slightest predominance of any one of the pigments gives the prevailing tone of the tints, whilst the addition of a further quantity of white produces all the numerous gradations, from lavender and lilac to French gray.

All colors in distemper are lighter when dry than they appear in a wet condition.

White is the basis of all tints, and is necessary in compounding the endless variety of pale colors required by the painter and decorator. Thus, white tinted with blue affords Paris white, French grays, silver grays, while among the red tints we have pink, carnation, coquilicot, and yellow with white gives primrose, straw-color and Isabella. To the colors compounded more or less with white we owe the innumerable tints of lilac, lavender, peach blossom, pea green and sage green, as shown in the preceding list of tints.

The painter is advised to mix the tints in different hues, giving in each experiment a predominance to one or other of the component colors.