Monday 13 August 2012

Not a black and white situation


In the ongoing process of replicating the Scagliola which itself replicates Porphyry, I need quite a few hundred little white chips...



... as well as quite a few (but considerably less) black ones.  I am making it up as I go along, but in going along I have spread thin layers of a particularly special plaster on a sheet of glass, one of them tinted a deep black.

They have been dried out in the sun and now I have to crush and grade them further, until they are exactly the same sizes and shapes of the original.  I will then have to assess the quantities that are needed to replicate the exact dispersal rate of the Georgian original, before mixing them in the red-based matrix which forms the background bulk of the Porphyry Scagliola.

Before I can do this, I have to carry out multiple colour-tests with plaster samples, until the exact hue of the blue-based red has been achieved, and I will have to keep an exact record of the quantities of pigments added (using scales) so that I can produce it a second/third/fourth/fifth - then final - time without accident.

When the missing parts have been replaced and polished, then I can begin restoring the lead-white paintings of cherubs which go over them.  That bit is going to be a doddle by comparison.

I seem to enjoy making life difficult for myself.

16 comments:

  1. This post could be confused for a 'Saponification Sunday' one, if you weren't wearing your glasses.

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  2. ............ and I'm going shopping, but good luck with that !

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  3. This is fascinating, please keep us up to speed as the work progresses. Hopefully soon my new cottage will be far enough along for me to accurately measure and then make the moulds for my polished concrete work surfaces. Nowhere near your league but a very brave step for me!

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    1. I love (some) polished concrete, but have never had the opportunity to use it. Good luck (as all the Scagliola experts said to me).

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  4. How's that for a coincidence? So soon after posting my first comment I received a package from a friend of mine from England followed quickly by a phone call. He told me that all the kit I needed was being unloaded from the container and would be delivered to me tomorrow. The package contained a book, 'Concrete Countertops' by Fu-Tung Sheng with Eric Olsen.

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  5. Did I ever mention that I'm a dab-hand at faux marble?

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    Replies
    1. Are you talking paint trompe l'oiel?

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    2. Yes. And also the non-trompe l'oeil early primitive styles.

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  6. I clicked your photos up big and recalled casting plaster of paris figurines in grade school, then painting them. Well, you're a good fifty or years down the road.

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    Replies
    1. All the latex moulds they give to kids these days are used for sex education, I fear.

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  7. Crikey. If all that work (and skill) doesn't deserve a pair of C&J's then I don't know what does..

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  8. And what has happened to Blogger's clock? Or can I really have my day back, to do with what I will, all chores done?

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  9. Tom, on my screen anyway the clock has mysteriously lost 8 hours. My last reply was 18:58, not 10:58.

    It's probably me. Running In Please Pass..

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