Glue-size
Encyclopedia
Glue-size
Sizing
Sizing or size is any one of numerous specific substances that is applied to or incorporated in other material, especially papers and textiles, to act as a protecting filler or glaze....

(in German Tiichlein or Tüchlein, sometimes referred to as Distemper in contrast to tempera
Tempera
Tempera, also known as egg tempera, is a permanent fast-drying painting medium consisting of colored pigment mixed with a water-soluble binder medium . Tempera also refers to the paintings done in this medium. Tempera paintings are very long lasting, and examples from the 1st centuries AD still exist...

) refers to a technique in painting where pigment
Pigment
A pigment is a material that changes the color of reflected or transmitted light as the result of wavelength-selective absorption. This physical process differs from fluorescence, phosphorescence, and other forms of luminescence, in which a material emits light.Many materials selectively absorb...

 is bound
Binder (material)
-See also:*Adhesive or Glue*Cement*Paint...

 to cloth
Textile
A textile or cloth is a flexible woven material consisting of a network of natural or artificial fibres often referred to as thread or yarn. Yarn is produced by spinning raw fibres of wool, flax, cotton, or other material to produce long strands...

 (usually linen
Linen
Linen is a textile made from the fibers of the flax plant, Linum usitatissimum. Linen is labor-intensive to manufacture, but when it is made into garments, it is valued for its exceptional coolness and freshness in hot weather....

) with glue extracted from animal skin. Typically the unvarnished linen was in turn fixed to its frame using the same glue. Glue was a popular binding medium in the 1400s, particularly among artists of the Early Netherlandish
Early Netherlandish painting
Early Netherlandish painting refers to the work of artists active in the Low Countries during the 15th- and early 16th-century Northern renaissance, especially in the flourishing Burgundian cities of Bruges and Ghent...

 period, who used it as an inexpensive alternative to oil
Oil painting
Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound with a medium of drying oil—especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Often an oil such as linseed was boiled with a resin such as pine resin or even frankincense; these were called 'varnishes' and were prized for their body...

. Although a large number of works using this medium were produced, few survive today, mainly because of the high perishability of linen cloth and the solubility of the hide glue. Well-known and relatively well-preserved—though substantially damaged—examples include Quentin Matsys
Quentin Matsys
Quentin Matsys was a painter in the Flemish tradition and a founder of the Antwerp school. He was born at Leuven, where legend states he was trained as an ironsmith before becoming a painter...

' c. 1415-25 The Virgin and Child with Saints Barbara and Catherine and Dirk Bouts
Dirk Bouts
Dieric Bouts was an Early Netherlandish painter. According to Karel van Mander in his Het Schilderboeck of 1604, Bouts was born in Haarlem and was mainly active in Leuven , where he was city painter from 1468...

' c 1440-55 Entombment
The Entombment (Bouts)
The Entombment is a glue-size painting on linen attributed to the Early Netherlandish painter Dirk Bouts. It shows a scene from the biblical entombment of Christ, probably completed between 1440 and 1455 as a wing panel for a large hinged polyptych altarpiece...

.

A binding agent for pigment was made by boiling animal skin mixed with other organic tissue and applied to linen, itself prepared with a thin layer of glue. Generally the linen was ground, or treated, by both the glue and also white chalk, which allowed a surface suitable for underdrawing and a base that would not absorb the final layer's pigment.

The advantage of using glue as a binder is that the colours render as matt
Matt
Matt may refer to:*In British English, of a surface: having a non-glossy finish, see gloss *Matt, Switzerland, a municipality*Matt , people with the given name Matt or Matthew, meaning "gift from god"...

 and opaque, as opposed to the translucent appearance associated with oil, textures suited to austere or mournful images. Many reds and blues bound in glue would have appeared with a brilliance and intensity difficult to achieve with oil. Unfortunately, the surviving examples have greatly deteriorated over time, having suffered from colour alteration due to exposure to light. Furthermore, the solubility of glue derived from animal products has meant that the accumulated layers of dirt cannot be removed without damaging the linen or dissolving the pigment.

Although it allowed fine linear detail, subtle tonal transition and at times vivid colourisation, by the end of the 1400s the medium, along with egg tempera
Tempera
Tempera, also known as egg tempera, is a permanent fast-drying painting medium consisting of colored pigment mixed with a water-soluble binder medium . Tempera also refers to the paintings done in this medium. Tempera paintings are very long lasting, and examples from the 1st centuries AD still exist...

, had fallen out of favour. Oil painting had become predominant among the artists of the early Northern Renaissance, mainly due to the innovations in oil by Jan van Eyck
Jan van Eyck
Jan van Eyck was a Flemish painter active in Bruges and considered one of the best Northern European painters of the 15th century....

 and Rogier van der Weyden.

Sources

  • Campbell, Lorne. The Fifteenth Century Netherlandish Paintings. National Gallery, 1998. ISBN 978-1-85709-171-7
  • Jones, Susan Frances. Van Eyck to Gossaert. National Gallery, 2011. ISBN 978-1-85709-504-3
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