Comments on: The Flemish method

By: Jan Bustin

Jan Bustin — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 22:10:52 +0000

Always nice to find out you’re not the only one crazy enough to make an attemp copying a Van Eyck. Born only one mile away from the native town of Van Eyck I have always been fascinated by his paintings since I can remember. Eleven years ago I painted “Madonna with cancelor Rolin” and now I am working on the “Arnolfini couple”
As a result of many experiments I came to using an emulsion as a medium. Rather lean in the first stages, but increasingly fat in the last layers and glazings. For small details and accents in the finishing I used verry lean waterbased tempera. In the first copy I partly used modern pigments, but now I turned over to authentic pigments as leadwhite, leadtin yellow, verdigris, azurite and lapi lazulli, madder lake and zinnober.
You can see some results on my website: http://www.janbustin.nl/nieuws/14/VAN+EYCK+VAN+DICHTBIJ+2.html
and:
http://www.janbustin.nl/nieuws/11/VAN+EYCK+VAN+DICHTBIJ+.html
Though in Dutch, there are to be seen some pictures from the copy and a part of its underdrawing.
I plan to place some pictures of the underdrawing for the Arnolfini-copy in the near future.

By: Jan Bustin

Jan Bustin — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 23:38:47 +0000

Hello Tim and David, As far as I am informed x ray analysis can only reveal lead containing paint such as leadwhite and leadtin yellow. Infrared reflectogram only reveals carbon containing colours. For example some sorts of ink, charcoal, black paint and colours mixed with black. But one can also make a drawing with other, no carbon or lead containing colours, which would be not visible in an x-ray analysis or an infrared reflectogram. Thus not every black part or line registered underneath the surface of a painting can be looked upon as underdrawing, and in some cases not every part of the underdrawing or drawing in between layers can be revealed by these methods of investigation

By: David

David — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 20:39:09 +0000

I've been a fan of Fred Wessel for years. I've only seen a few of his paintings in person, but they are masterful.

By: David

David — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 20:37:44 +0000

There's nothing wrong with the technique. It's simply modern, not historical. I'm not as clear on Rubens, but that does not jibe with my limited understanding of his technique.

By: azoth

azoth — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 22:45:03 +0000

Hmm .Check t his guy’s art out: http://fredwessel.com/ I have used Anton technique for a long time. I am sad to hear it is not the Flemmish technique. My teacher told me
that Rubens and others covered their drawing with a brown sauce then did the shadows
then modelled up all wet into wet. I was told Rubens worked mainly this way.

By: Lesley Nolan

Lesley Nolan — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 16:14:22 +0000

forgot to mention I used INK for drawing entire portrait copy, burnt umber and burnt sienna ink. I have read in enough places to see they did not like ‘black’ but mixed their ultramarine with their burnt umber or other dark earth color to get those rich but still glowing backgrounds…I follow their example.

By: Lesley Nolan

Lesley Nolan — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 16:10:27 +0000

fyi anyone interested, the London National Gallery site is awesome but unless you live in the UK getting a print is expensive. Around 75 US$ for the smallest, the shipping is 17 pounds and print is 15 pounds! I got prints while there to bring home. Then sanded off the face of my Van Eyck copy and started over after gessoe-ing and smoothing the small canvas. I did find vermillion to be a good match to the turban in beginning stages. Anyway the London National Gallery is restoring some works right now, if you go on the site you can the progress! It really is interesting, and they show underdrawing in some x-rays.
My Campin copy—I printed from computer, sigh. Then transferred line drawing to gesso panel. Then did a burnt umber and bt. sienna line drawing. Then painted first layer-background of bt umber and ultramarine, first thin layer of coat in umber. I started a value study on the turban in ink. Then switched to flake white and bt. umber and am on that now. I use stand oil. I did find sun thickened stand oil and am using that on a different project but dont love it. Stand oil and a little mona lisa seems to have made the previous van eyck copy more transparent. I realize home made oils wouldnt need a medium and I believe that was Van Eycks advantage. Some oils are SO thick out of the tube it’s ridiculous. Well anyway I found before I need to get soft brushes and go over my work and smooth out ANY ‘blobs’ and keep each layer very smooth and blended.
in short my friends think I’m nuts but they do like the results.

By: Lesley Nolan

Lesley Nolan — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 15:58:32 +0000

Greetings, Enjoying your post tremendously, I am a devotee of Van Eyck, Van der Weyden et al. Around 5 years ago I decided to reproduce the Man in Red Turban for an oil class-just for fun. (irony intended)! I got a good print and enlarged it and was staggered to see every wrinkle under the eye, the blood vessels in the eye, small veins—even what looked like a reflection in the pupil and the original painting of the head is probably half size or so!! Using a pen and ink (finest crowquill) was the ONLY way I could even get the details on the gessoed canvas. (Gessoed canvas was mistake one believe me– I was a product of 70’s art school and painting on panel was not mentioned outside of art history class, sadly). Well I did a green (verdacio) layer on top of a burnt umber value layer…If nothing else the green lent a very realist tone to the subsequent flesh tones. BUT keeping those tiny details was almost impossible even with the smallest brushes. I am talking 0 to 000 and smaller. One was a couple hairs. YIKES. My dream came true in ‘05 when I got to London National Gallery. I stood in front of the paintings until the guard laughed and said “Miss, I think you might need to back up just a bit”. Sigh. Even tiny, you can see that even the whiskers are three dimensional, not jus strokes of a brush but tiny SOLID objects. I am PERPLEXED. and like the other poster, as in the St. Barbara—convinced that the entire drawing was done to last perfect detail, then somehow he must have laid on transparent color..IF not I do not know how he used a brush to eg. make a whisker, or the mole on an eyelid Three Dimensional. (Some attribute it to aliens and give up trying to figure it out, LOL)
PS I am now copying Robert Campin’s Portrait of a Man (in a red turban as well) on gessoed board. Wish me luck.

By: David

David — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 18:36:03 +0000

Ah. That's different. Sorry for the misunderstanding.

By: Gela

Gela — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 18:09:48 +0000

Sorry, I wasn’t clear, RSG on top of silverpoint and ink washes only, then egg tempera etc. I’ll play.