Monthly Archives: May 2023

Sunday Group Update – May

This month we were backing pictures because some of the group had not tried it before. To get a good result you need to lay the picture face down and lightly spray it. Leave to even out and then brush it flat using a dry wall paper pasting brush (or similar) working out from the centre of the picture. 

                                                                                                              __________________________________________________

When it’s flat, apply the paste, again working out  from the centre of the picture. Remove excess paste from the table. Apply the backing sheet and brush it on again working from the centre out. Cover with news paper and brush over to remove excess water. Repeat until newspaper is dry. Brush paste along the edges of the backing paper avoiding the area over the picture itself. Lift the backed picture – with the picture towards you and stick it to a board, north facing window, internal glass door or kitchen cupboard. Insert a tab to make removal easier. Leave for about a week to dry in damp weather or a coupe of days if its dry. Check it is dry before removing.

To remove, insert a plastic knife, or similar – lying flat – behind the tab but NOT behind the picture and slide the knife around (as illustrated below) to remove the picture from the board / surface. DO NOT stab the knife into the sheet you are sliding it under the edge well away from the painting and work all the way round. Don’t be tempted to just pull the picture off as soon as any part of it is free. You could rip the painting. You may tear the backing paper that is not under the painting – this doesn’t matter. Trim off the excess backing paper 

The results of our mounting session are shown below.

Sunday Group update – April

This month we were looking at the wonderful layered works of Huang Yongyu (2 Images below). 

Colour layering is great fun. You have to work from the back forward allowing each layer to dry before adding the next one. You create a random background. Let it dry. Add the ink work. Let it dry. Add the flowers and birds mixed with mineral colour to keep the image on the surface. We used hair dryers because the class is only 3 hours – no time to wait!

These are the results: