CHED 35 |
| Throughout history, many different materials have been used to bind pigments into paintings. Shifts in media, from egg tempera to drying oil for example, necessarily change the painting technique and, therefore, the style of the painting. Using the historical manuscript recipe of Cennini, we have recreated the heating process used in making paint by such influential artists as Van Eyck. The process of heating the oil effectively jump starts the drying process by initiating the polymerization of the fatty acids in the oils. Spectrophotometric and gas chromatographic analysis of the oils was used to monitor the chemical reaction that is occurring throughout the drying process. Although medieval artists did not have the advanced technology to understand their observations of faster drying paint at the molecular level, clearly they understood that the the physical properties of their materials influenced the process of artistic creation. |
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Center for Workshops in the Chemical Sciences (CWCS)
1:30 PM-5:15 PM, Sunday, August 19, 2007 Seaport -- Constitution Room, Oral
Division of Chemical Education |