Warning! Don't use damar as a final picture varish

[Valentino Radman]

Speaking about synthetic varnishes, I found Golden MSA varnish (with UV-filter) to be a very good one, as well. I mix the Gloss and Matte variety in order to achieve the desired sheen.

Btw, Virgil, have you received my private e-mail sent to you on your aol.com account three weeks ago?

[Anthony Emmolo]

You guys are frightening me. I have been using retouch varnish almost each morning at the beginning of my painting day. It brings the freshness of the painting back to light. It is the only way that I can add new paint to the canvas. Without it, the fresh paint looks different than the paint that I applied the day before. Especially in the shadow areas which dry chalky. Then, I apply a thin layer of painting medium by Falens, which is the medium I use throughout the painting to loosen up my paints after squeezing them from the tubes. After that, I apply a final coat of Damar varnish and have never experienced cloudiness. My work is sold in galleries for the past four years, and I haven't received any phone calls about yellowing.

1- Am I using retouch varnish wrong? If so, how can I work with the chalkiness of a painting when I want to add new paint to the painting and cannot accurately see the values and temperature of chalky paint compared to fresh paint?
2- How long after use does the yellowing of Damar varnish begin?

[Virgil Elliott]

Soluvar is a good varnish, as long as you like the way it looks. It's what most museums used until Gamvar was invented. Gamvar has the look of damar without the yellow, so the appearance is more appropriate for certain paintings. Soluvar is my second choice.

Virgil Elliott

[Virgil Elliott]

Originally Posted by Allan Rahbek

Virgil,
I would also like to thank you for sharing your expertise.

Is there any alternative to this Gamvar Varnish?

Are you familiar with the use of Egg White for varnishing ?

Allan

Allan,

Yes, I am familiar with egg white as a varnish. It's a terrible idea.

Of course there are alternatives to Gamvar. Golden's MSA Varnish is a good one, which I had forgotten about until Valentino mentioned it, and Liquitex Soluvar. Winsor & Newton's Winton Picture Varnish is also pretty good. Gamvar is my personal first choice, however. It was developed by conservation scientist Rene De La Rie, of the National Gallery of Art, Washington.

Virgil Elliott

[William Whitaker]

Virgil,

Thanks so much for responding to my email and contributing to my post. Once again, I'm amazed by the effort and care you give to provide us good and useful information. Everybody who reads this post on damar varnish should copy your contribution and save it for reference.

All you folks out there in Oil Painting Land, Virgil really knows his stuff. Pay attention.

In 1973, I was painting without the addition of any painting/glazing medium at all. For a while I used Ralph Mayer's concoction -- stand oil plus damar resin -- but I found it very difficult to use when I wanted to do sensitive high finish detail work.

In my case, I would not have messed with the little painting at all if it had been done by anybody else. Since it was mine, I was none too careful, knowing I could repair any damage I would inflict.

Naturally, acetone cut the damar, as did denatured alcohol. It never occured to me to use mineral spirits to stop the solvent action. Oh well.

I was pretty rough on the painting when I removed the varnish. In spite of being beaten up, the painting actually held up pretty well. Paint is tougher than we expect sometimes.

I recently cleaned another painting, done in 1976 and varnished with damar. In that case, I got the varnish off without too much trouble. I don't know why. It too had appreciably yellowed -- was beginning to take on a golden tone.

Anthony,
I too use damar retouch varnish from time to time. I don't think it contains much damar, for the gloss doesn't last very long. I believe it might be mostly solvent.
You won't notice any yellowing in the final damar varnish for maybe two decades. Remember too that in the past collectors were fond of that yellowing. They called it "gallery tone." I wouldn't worry much about it. Perhaps you can get Virgil to jump in again and give you the authoritive word.

Bill

[Virgil Elliott]

Originally Posted by Anthony Emmolo

You guys are frightening me. I have been using retouch varnish almost each morning at the beginning of my painting day. It brings the freshness of the painting back to light. It is the only way that I can add new paint to the canvas. Without it, the fresh paint looks different than the paint that I applied the day before. Especially in the shadow areas which dry chalky. Then, I apply a thin layer of painting medium by Falens, which is the medium I use throughout the painting to loosen up my paints after squeezing them from the tubes. After that, I apply a final coat of Damar varnish and have never experienced cloudiness. My work is sold in galleries for the past four years, and I haven't received any phone calls about yellowing.

1- Am I using retouch varnish wrong? If so, how can I work with the chalkiness of a painting when I want to add new paint to the painting and cannot accurately see the values and temperature of chalky paint compared to fresh paint?
2- How long after use does the yellowing of Damar varnish begin?

Anthony,

You can accomplish the same thing by oiling out instead of using retouch varnish, but you might need to give the painting a bit more time to dry between sittings. A very thin scrub-in of linseed oil over the area to be repainted will do the trick. Wipe off as much of it as will come off after you've scrubbed it on, before you paint into it. What remains is all that is needed. The chalky look you mention might be due to the colors you've chosen. Umbers are particularly bad in that way, burnt umber especially. I very seldom use burnt umber any more, for that reason mainly.

You can do many things wrong and not see the consequences for fifty or more years. That doesn't mean they aren't going to happen. Look to the conservation field to get an idea what holds up and what causes problems.

Virgil Elliott

[Virgil Elliott]

Originally Posted by Valentino Radman

Speaking about synthetic varnishes, I found Golden MSA varnish (with UV-filter) to be a very good one, as well. I mix the Gloss and Matte variety in order to achieve the desired sheen.

Btw, Virgil, have you received my private e-mail sent to you on your aol.com account three weeks ago?

Valentino,

I just looked for it and could not find it. If you still have it, please send it again. It might have been in with the mountain of e-mails that came in while I was off riding my motorcycle for a few days, and I must have missed it somehow.

Thanks for the reminder about Golden's MSA Varnish. I haven't tried it, but I know Golden's products are top quality, so I'd use it with confidence if I weren't already completely satisfied with Gamvar.

Virgil

[Virgil Elliott]

Originally Posted by William Whitaker

Virgil,

Thanks so much for responding to my email and contributing to my post. Once again, I'm amazed by the effort and care you give to provide us good and useful information. Everybody who reads this post on damar varnish should copy your contribution and save it for reference.

All you folks out there in Oil Painting Land, Virgil really knows his stuff. Pay attention.

Bill,

Thanks for the vote of confidence. It seems every time I post here, I'm deluged with questions to answer. Once my book is published, I'll just recommend people buy that and find the answers there. Watson-Guptill has sent me a contract, and is scheduling it for release in April of 2007. Meanwhile, I have a lot of illustrations to do before my deadline, so I need to put more time into that until everything is as good as I can make it.

If you're ever in my neck of the woods, look me up.

Virgil

[Kimberly Dow]

Virgil,

A hearty congratulations! I'm so glad to hear the book is being published.

[Anthony Emmolo]

You know your stuff Virgil,

The colors that dry chalky are indeed the earth colors. Two of my favorite earth tones are Burnt Umber and Burnt Sienna. They are both known for chalkiness. However, Burnt Umber with a mix of Ultramarine Blue or Prussian blue gives a beautiful warm deep shadow. I've tried other brown family colors and I enjoy Burnt Umber the most. I've also done the oil rubs, and it works very well for small areas. I guess that is the way I will have to work in the future. I was using the Retouch varnish to work the whole painting at once.

Another question though:
What is the proper use of Retouch Varnish? A friend of mine, a 65ish year old woman from Milano, who was trained in the old style studios of Italy in her youth told me that Retouch Varnish has a different use. Her English wasn't good enough to explain the proper function of Retouch Varnish, and my Italian wasn't good enough to rely on that.

I live in Shanghai, China and books are basically impossible to come by here. I naively left my Ralph Mayer book in California. Can you tell me a website that would have information on the dangers of misusing materials, and the correct ways to use them. Please don't mention Amazon.com for a purchase. I'm here rebuilding an art career after a couple of bad gallery sale years and my credit card has been melted during the crunch as my debts went through the roof. At the moment I am a part-time painter-part time English teacher.
Thank you in advance,
Anthony