The editor of ‘Artists & Illustrators’ asked us for an article about the challenges and joys of stained glass painting.
Now his readers already use brushes with considerable skill. But, of course, they work on paper or canvas etc. Not glass.
We had just 500 words or so. Here’s the article we wrote for them.
In the studio this week, we’re painting column after column for the tycoon’s stained glass skylights.
Our sequence is:
In other words, the lines are put down in two layers – steps 2 and 3 – not in one go.
A column from the tycoon’s skylights – undercoat and (copy-)traced only (strengthening comes next)
Now it isn’t mandatory to do this. It’s certainly possible to do the lines just in one go. Sometimes that’s what you must do.
And right now I just want to have a brief discussion with you about how to think about this question: whether to trace (with the glass on top of the design) and then strengthen (with the design on one side), or whether to trace and strengthen in one go …
Gum Arabic isn’t essential. (Patrick Reyntiens, for example, barely uses it at all.) It’s just that, without it, our dried, unfired paint would be extremely fragile.
Also, we would not be able to shade and matt as we want to – that is, all in one firing, including oil-based paint on top.
Now stained glass painting stockists mainly stock gum Arabic in powdered form.
But I prefer the liquid, and here is why:
Liquid gum Arabic is the same medium that water-colour painters use.
So just find a good supplier of traditional art materials, and they will help you.
Ours is made by Winsor & Newton.
Stained glass painting – liquid gum Arabic is easier to work with than gum Arabic in powdered form
Best,
It is 3:12 in the morning. I am wide awake as I often, listening to those radio podcasts which I can’t hear during the day because I prefer silence when I paint glass (or J.S. Bach).
Suddenly, in the middle of the night, I am attacked by a sudden fit of breathless spluttering, a violent seizure.