Tuesday at the Conference

On Tuesday I attended Homage to Fayum, an all-day workshop taught by Francisco Benitez at the Fourth Annual Encaustic Conference. This was terrific and Francisco a/k/a Paco is a great teacher.

Those Fayum portraits are so compelling that they are admired throughout the world and leave many people wondering how they were made. Paco has spent a lot of time researching them and other ancient works in Greece and Italy, and in this class he explained that the portraits were painted with just four earth (mineral) colors: red ochre, yellow ochre, black (from ash) and white (powdered gypsum or powdered calcium carbonate). Francisco was a visiting artist at R & F and demonstrated the process there. The R & F colors that we used in our workshop were Mars Red, Mars Yellow Light, Mars Black and a mixture of Titanium White and Neutral White.

Above: One of the original portraits found in the Fayum district of Egypt (now in The Metropolitan Museum, NY) 125-50 A.D., encaustic on wood, 14 5/8” x 7 7/8”


Right: A mummy portrait in place on a mummy (This mummy and portrait are dated to 80-100 A.D. from the Fayum district of Egypt. The portrait is encaustic on limewood.) The portraits were painted to depict deceased people. Whether they were done earlier in life when the person was still youthful or made as idealized portrayals after death is unknown.

I'm reviewing this information for you so that you will have the context in mind for the work that Paco has been able to analyze and the process he has recreated.

It has been difficult to discover exactly how the ancients worked because so few tools and no real treatises have been found about it. One of the few finds of artist's tools was made in northern France with the discovery of the tools of a Greek woman artist.

These are ancient spatula-type tools called "cauderia" in Latin. The ancient process was to work vertically and apply the melted wax with a brush or spatula and fuse it by bringing near a cage containing hot coals mounted on the end of a stick. (This so reminds me of Jasper Johns' method of a hot plate on a stick for fusing.)

There are three processes that Paco uses in his contemporary work: a brush in one hand and a heat gun in the other, a heated tool connected to electric power, a non-electric cold tool that can be used alone or with a heat gun or even a hair dryer.

He begins his works by preparing a cradled panel with rabbitskin glue pigmented to a dark greenish black. He lets this dry overnight. and the next day he makes a sketch on the panel with charcoal or conte. He applies a coat of encaustic medium to preserve the sketch and seal in the rabbitskin glue.

The beginning colors are a cool dark, mixed from black and yellow ochre, and a warm dark, mixed from black and red ochre. A sketch is made on the greenish black ground with the warm dark (reddish) so that it is visible.

Francisco Benitez did this sketch of an eye in our workshop. The greenish black in the center is the rabbitskin glue ground. The darkest color is the reddish black mixed with black and red ochre. The red color that will underlay flesh tones is mixed with red and yellow ochres.

Francisco Benitez blending colors and fusing paint with an electric tool.

Working on the sketch with a brush and heat gun.

The process is to work from dark to light. (A procedure known as tenebrism.) All the skin tones are underlaid with a red mixed from red ochre, yellow ochre and black. The whites and light yellows are laid on only at the end of the process as the volume of the figure emerges from darkness. Note that the tools or blending brushes both blend the colors together to give volume in the portrait and at the same time fuse the encaustic with heat.

Hot tools are cast tips that are attached to handles with temperature-controlling regulators. They are the type of tools used for woodburning and only the heads are different. R & F Paint is working with Sculpture House to manufacture the specialized heads, which will be available in August.

Cold tools - Many of these tools are used in sculpture and are currently available from Sculpture House.

This is an unfinished portrait that Paco painted in his demo class earlier in the conference.

Here is a closeup of the portrait showing the modeling and marks made from the heated tools.

This is our model Arielle (I hope I have the spelling correctly.) who sat for us all day long. She was also the sitter for Paco's sketch above.

Here is my portrait completed in the workshop. I haven't painted a portrait in 20 years so my modelling leaves a lot to be desired, but I had a lot of fun mixing color with just the four hues. It's amazing how much variety you can get with such a limited palette. My color does not follow the standard of the Greek painters who used much more yellowish skin tones. I think I'll keep working on this portrait and see if I can push back that Jay Leno chin in my painting.

And just to show the wonderful results that can be achieved by a master of this technique and a beautiful painter, here is one of Francisco Benitez's finished portraits from his website.

Epithimia, encaustic on panel, 24" x 20"

I enjoyed this workshop a lot even though, or maybe because, it was so different from my way of working and the works that I usually produce. Sometimes it's really beneficial to make an extreme redirection to appreciate what you already have.

Post Post-Conference
Julie Shaw Lutts, a conferee (and a member of New England Wax, I might add) graciously invited post-conferees to a barbecue at her home in Salem on Tuesday evening. She has a gorgeous Architectural Digest-type home located on a marsh in the next town over from Beverly.

The setting looking out from Julie's yard.

The food was absolutely delicious and the deserts were to die for. Many of them were intensely chocolate, including the birthday cake that Julie made for Sarah Bartlett, her friend and one of the conferees.

Sitting on the lawn in Julie's yard. (Thea Haubrich in the foreground.) Through the trees in the distance is one of the coves on the waters of the Atlantic Ocean in Salem.

This was quite an end to the conference for me. All the chocolate that I consumed was enough to keep me wide awake for the two-hour drive back home to western Massachusetts, and I barely had to sing to keep my eyes open. I was mighty glad to see my little homestead and to sleep in my own bed last night, but I sure did have fun at the conference.

A Demo Turns Up New Non-Family

On Saturday Lynette and I did an encaustic demonstration for Physical Geography at ArtSpace. We had a really great turnout of about 40 people who asked plenty of questions about the process and paid close attention to our presentation.

Show and Tell table with sample in-process panels, samples of raw wax and resin, handouts, etc.

We had a fun time with our tag team approach. First one of us showed something and then the other stepped in. If one of us forgot something, the other filled in the blanks. It worked very well and was much better than demonstrating alone - a lot more fun and less nervious-making.



Lynette at the Show and Tell table talking about supports.



Here I demonstrated fusing with a heat gun while Lynette prepared to show how to fuse with a propane torch.


Another shot of the tag team approach - Lynette overpaints with red while I think I'm rubbing off excess oilstick.



View from the back of the room.


We also spoke about the work that was hanging in the show and explained how various effects were achieved. I revealed the identify of many of the materials incorporated in my paintings and made everyone sign secrecy agreements before they left.

Here I'm showing that it's important to use only one hand for fusing so that the other will be free to gesture.

Probably the most important information we conveyed in this demo was that ENCAUSTIC IS NOT TOXIC when wax is kept at the proper temperature. So many people have misconceptions about this. We talked quite a bit about temperature, composition of encaustic paint, non-inclusion of solvents, etc. to counter people's previous ideas and showed them the R&F Paints handout about setting up your studio for proper ventilation.

An interesting thing that happened after the demo was that four people came up to me whose name was "Natale." (They pronounced it "Natalie" like the woman's name, whereas I say Natale with a silent "e" the French way, as in femme fatale.) They came to the demo because they had seen my name in the paper and wondered if I was a relative. They had a now-deceased sister named Nancy Natale who was also an artist, and while they sat through the demo, they were looking for resemblances between me and their family. They did see several physical points of comparison, but I had to tell them that it was just coincidence because "Natale" is actually an acronyn name that I composed and adopted about 20 years ago. It comes from the initials of my birth name, the last names of two ex-husbands and a final "e" for "end." They were very gracious about it and didn't seem too disappointed, but neither did I get the invite to the family Sunday dinner.

My Encaustic Learning Curve

"Blue Skies", encaustic, plant parts and raffia on board, 12"x12", 2007

In 2004 I attended a 3-day introductory encaustic workshop taught by Cynthia Winiker at R&F Paints in Kingston, NY. That was a big deal for me to spend that much money and time away from home, and it showed the extent of my interest, but for the life of me I can't remember what prompted my initial interest in encaustic. Crazy, huh? Oh, well, I've forgotten more important things, I guess. Anyway, I just loved encaustic and the workshop was wonderful - all the info I needed to set up my studio and get going with the new medium. I bought a bunch of paint and tools and drove home ready to make it my own.

Then, pretty much nothing for three years or so. Oh, I dabbled and played around but the work I made didn't look much like anything I was making in any other medium and even the pallette of colors I used was not really me: many of the original pieces used red, yellow and white. What the hell was that?

So 2004 and 2005 were pretty much a bust. If you look at the picture of my old studio in the right column, you'll probably see why. Then 2006 was the Year of Moving. Bonnie and I spent that whole year packing, getting rid of or moving stuff to storage near where we would live, and generally getting ready to sell our house and 20 acres in Ashfield. Originally we were going to be part of a mill building redevelopment into loft spaces in North Adams, but that project fell through (thank God), and we decided to move to Easthampton (next door to Northampton and near Amherst and Springfield). I was without a studio for nearly the whole of 2006 until November 1st when I began leasing my current space in the Eastworks Building.

That meant I didn't begin painting with encaustic again until 2007, and not until then did I start making work that I felt was more my own. I had a lot of false starts and experiments, but when I hit on the idea of incorporating parts of plants from my garden, it started to make more sense to me. I also joined New England Wax in November 2007 and that has been so important to the development of my work in encaustic. Being able to network with other artists painting in encaustic has really broadened my idea of what encaustic can be and at the same time helped me to focus on what I want to do with it.

Encaustic pieces painted in 2007 - about half made the cut

Another very important aspect of belonging to N.E.W. is that it has pushed me to make work to submit for shows. Making work is what has to happen to gain control of the process, so whatever motivates me to do that is really valuable. I need prodding, as most of us do. The Malcolm Gladwell tenet about needing 10,000 hours to master something is probably true - not that I've spent that long working in encaustic, but I'm getting there.

Of course, the encaustic conference has been a wonderful benefit. What a great opportunity to be able to learn various technical processes, discuss the world of encaustic painting, listen to critical panels, see juried shows of top-quality work, hear important keynote speakers and just generally hang out with pals in the cozy confines of the encaustic world. We are so fortunate to have this treasure every year. Thank you, Joanne! (and Montserrat)

I haven't really been comfortable enough to show my encaustic work outside of the encaustic bubble, but I'm starting. This year, I submitted one of my encaustic pieces to the jurying process for the MassArt auction and it was accepted (for the silent auction - not on the block). I've always sold my work here, and even though it goes for half price, it's seen by a huge number of people and exposure is a Good Thing - right, Martha?

Last year (and this) I've made a big push in the studio to make more work in encaustic because of the show that Lynette and I presented at ArtSpace which needed so many pieces and also because there were a lot of juried shows to enter that overlapped and required that different work be submitted to each. I made way more work in 2008 than ever before and finally got to work much bigger than previously.

I have set up a way of working that is comfortable to me, and I can control the medium to accomplish what I want (so far). My next goal is to get my table saw set up for making panels and to get a vent fan installed. Here again, N.E.W. is invaluable because I took Kim's course in using power tools and I can consult with two friends (Lynette and Sue) for advice on setting up the vent system.

I think I'm in a good place with encaustic - even though I'm not working in it at the moment (still working on those saleable paper pieces). I know where I want to go with it for my next series and choosing that direction is most of the battle for me. Wax on!

Selected Paintings/New Paintings

Maybe I should just resign myself to thinking of the Selected Paintings as always being new ones. Of course the new ones are always the ones I'm most excited about. So here we go.

New Blue Diptychs - a Different Direction

Last week I made three new diptychs. I received the new free Manganese Blue color from R&F Paint (offer no longer available) and decided to use it along with my usual pallette of blues to make some new pieces on the 16"x16" Rodney Thompson panels I still had. I'm getting ready for my show with Lynette Haggard at ArtSpace and wanted to make some smaller work.


Limiting my color to a particular small range is unusual for me, but a practice I think it is helpful to try - at least every once in a while.

Thinking Sideways, encaustic and mixed media, 2009, each panel 16" x 16" x 1.5"

Using just the blues (plus a couple of greens, greys and black and white)*, I found myself making very loose, boundaryless marks - not like my usual work. I did incorporate some dried tubers** and things that I had in the studio that gave some form and focus to the pieces.

Exploring the Deep, encaustic and mixed media, 2009, each panel 16" x 16" x 1.5"

This work seemed to lend itself to the diptych format, but I thought that the two halves needed to have a significant difference between them. Filling sections of one half of each diptych with repetitive small forms brought in a geometric element but didn't create the boundaries between areas that I usually make. It allowed me to stay loose but still include some gridded areas. I am really pleased with this work and I can see a series in it.

Outreach, encaustic and mixed media, 2009, each panel 16" x 16" x 1.5"


*I should say that these are the colors on top. Underneath I have a lot more color - mostly warm to hot.

**I'm not going into a lot of detail about this because I think it's only important to my process and it's better if people (viewers) don't get distracted by focusing on this stuff.