Grounds, or preparatory layers, form the basis upon which all artistic paintings are executed and can have a great impact on the ‘success’ of a painting, influencing both its aesthetic qualities and its longevity. Artists in different locations and at different times selected various materials and techniques to prepare their supports for painting. The subject of grounds also occupied the minds of the authors of artists’ manuals, recipe books and related historical sources. They wrote about ground colour and the devastating effect a faulty ground could have on the long-term stability of a painting, discussing materials, application methods, ground texture and its effects on the visual qualities of paintings.
A Perfect Ground is the first comprehensive study of the materials and techniques described in historical recipes for ground layers, focusing on North West Europe during the period 1550–1900. It evaluates these recipes, places them within a time frame and investigates geographical differences. The role of recipe books in the daily life of painters is examined as is the influence of commercial ground preparation on painting practice and the relationship between written recipes and actual life in the painter’s studio.
A Perfect Ground will be of interest to researchers and students in the fields of art history and conservation. The case studies form a useful introduction to recipe-based research, particularly for those interested in the application of reconstructions in the field of cultural heritage.
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Foreword
Acknowledgements
Prologue: terminology of preparatory layers for oil painting
Chapter 1 Introduction
Chapter 2 The recipe collection, the authors and the impact of the recipes
Chapter 3 Preparatory layers of paintings in northwest Europe c.1400– 1550
Chapter 4 Chronological developments in preparatory layer recipes 1550–1900
Chapter 5 The materials described in the recipes
Chapter 6 Application and texture of preparatory layers
Chapter 7 The colour of preparatory layers
Chapter 8 Professional primers
Chapter 9 The ageing of preparatory layers
Chapter 10 Size layers for oil painting in western European sources (1500-1900): historical recipes and reconstructions
Chapter 11 Flour paste in recipes for preparatory layers for oil painting, 1550–1900
Chapter 12 ‘To prepare white excellent…’: reconstructions investigating the influence of washing, grinding and decanting of stack-process lead white on pigment composition and particle size
Chapter 13 Reconstructing seventeenth-century streaky imprimaturas used on panel paintings
Chapter 14 Conclusions
Appendix 13 Comparative overview of recipes for ‘brown-red’ first grounds
Appendix 14 Authors of recipes for preparatory layers for oil painting and their occupations
Appendix 17 Flour paste or starch sizing layers and grounds
Annotated bibliography of primary sources consulted
General bibliography
Index
The Picture Restorer, Vol 54, 2019 p5
Perfect Ground: Preparatory Layers for Oil Paintings 1550-1900 is the culmination of many years of solo and collaborative research by Maartje Stols-Witlox. Derived initially from Stols-Witlox’s role as research associate on the Historically Accurate Reconstruction Techniques Project ..., the research underpinning the book is broadly tripartite: consisting of original recipes examined in their historiographic contexts, reconstructions of those recipes, and analyses of original paintings drawn together from published sources...
There is no doubt that this is a major text for paintings conservation and art history, synthesising and summarising large bodies of technical information and recipes. It is also a welcome paean for the utility of recipe and painting reconstructions in technical art history, bridging the gap often found between the results of instrumental analysis of original materials and the recipes from which they were made.
