This week I have been researching the techniques I am going to need to begin my studio experiments for my current project which is making art that relates to the bee goddess, Melissa. I have chosen to use melted wax in this project (known as encaustic art) because bees make beeswax and this link between the meaning of my artworks and the process used to make them really appeals to me.
Although you can buy ready-made encaustic mediums, I wanted to make my own. I tried this out last year and I remember how much I enjoyed working with natural ingredients and watching the magical process of them transforming as they blended together. Melting together the beeswax and tree resin in the slow cooker (the modern-day witches cauldron!) is such a satisfying, alchemical process.
I used these books for guidance, firstly to remind me how to go about making the medium. Secondly, how to select and prepare the surfaces that I would eventually be painting on. The first book by Michael Bossom is good for complete beginners and that was what I used last year to get me started with this medium. However, this year I wanted more to develop a more in-depth professional level of understanding and Joanne Mattera’s book really helped me there. It is detailed, explains all the options and helps you make informed choices, just what I wanted in fact.
Encaustic Art – How to paint with wax by Michael Bossom and
The Art of Encaustic Painting by Joanne Mattera
I decided that I wanted to make small works of art for this project, perhaps postcard size? certainly no bigger than 7 x 5″. I wanted the size of my work to draw the publics attention to how small but important these little bees are (for our survival). This environmental issue is something I have learned more about from the excellent website bumblebeeconservation.org. I was shocked to discover that 93% of our wildflowers have disappeared since the 1930s due to intensive farming. This inspired me to include wildflowers in the artworks.
I had some small canvas boards which were the right size and I thought would be ideal for my encaustic experiments and also my final paintings. However, I discovered from my research that they would not be suitable after all. Hot wax will not stick to anything acrylic-based and these canvasses had been prepared for painting (by the manufacturer) with acrylic-based gesso. I didn’t want to waste the canvasses so needed to find a way of adapting them to suit my purpose – this was my first challenge!
I came up with the idea of glueing watercolour paper onto to the canvasboard’s surface to create a surface suitable for hot wax and this is what I did. I experimented by glueing with PVA and also with ‘Golden’ matte medium, they both dried equally well overnight (weighed down with heavy books), so I decided to use PVA in future because it’s cheaper.
When it came to trimming the excess watercolour paper away from the edges of the canvas-covered boards I discovered that trimming with a scalpel gave poor results, the paper ripped a little in parts. So then I tried using a single-bladed razor and this was much better. It gave an acceptable finish. I then sandpapered the edges with fine sandpaper to make them really smooth and ready to work on.
Meanwhile, I had ordered some wooden boards from Amazon and they arrived together with some encaustic medium (encaustic gesso suitable for encaustic work). What a difference that made! It was so easy to just apply the right medium to the plywood. One coat and they were ready to use.
I concluded that I’m going to use the paper-covered canvasses for my experiments (so I don’t waste them) but use the wooden boards for my final pieces and continue with this preferred method in the future.
I’m so pleased to be learning all this from first-hand experience! For me, it is the best teacher. The next stage will be learning to fuse the melted wax with my heat gun…
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