© Michael Price Inc.
| Studio equipment with pestels, mortars, glass and granite mullers and sieves. The large pestel and mortar is cast iron bought in a market in Seoul, granite bought in China town, New York. This is used mainly for cinnabar which is crushed very easily. Rocks and crystals include azurite, lapis lazuli, malachite, vivianite, cinnabar, orpiment, realgar, purpurite, quartz, calcite, yellow ochres, haematite, red bolus, red jasper, stibnite and pyrolusite. Azurite Briefly, the levigation process for azurite is as follows: 1. Mix the coarsely ground pigment in a bowl with a casein solution. Pour off the initial blue-grey liquid into a second bowl. Add water to the first bowl, stir and decant again. Eventually a powerful blue appears. Each time water is added, some more impurity - yellow to brown - will appear on the surface. Through a gentle swilling action, the impurity is poured off into a separate bowl. The whole process is repeated with the second bowl. 2. After this initial levigation, dry the pigment. Grind this coarse pigment preferably on a sand-blasted glass plate with a glass muller. Repeat the levigation process to further remove impurities. In each successive bowl, the solution becomes more diluted and the pigment finer. I require about 8 working hours to produce 10 grades of purest azurite from a deep blue to a pale sky blue from 100 grams of crushed rock. |
| Test Panel (Chroma Panel No. 4) |
Chroma Panel No. 1
2003.
Natural and mineral pigments layered in either tempera and/or oil on linen
glued to a wooden panel.
54 x 60 cm.
No. 1: Sold with photgraphs of the crystals on this page.
2003.
Natural and mineral pigments layered in either tempera and/or oil on linen
glued to a wooden panel.
54 x 60 cm.
No. 1: Sold with photgraphs of the crystals on this page.
Chroma Panel No. 2
2003.
Natural and mineral pigments layered in either tempera and/or
oil on linen glued to a wooden panel.
54 x 60 cm.
2003.
Natural and mineral pigments layered in either tempera and/or
oil on linen glued to a wooden panel.
54 x 60 cm.
Chroma Panel No. 3
2003.
Natural and mineral pigments layered in either tempera and/or
oil on linen glued to a wooden panel.
54 x 60 cm.
2003.
Natural and mineral pigments layered in either tempera and/or
oil on linen glued to a wooden panel.
54 x 60 cm.
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| This Chroma Panel shows a small selection of mineral pigments as well as one historical manufactured blue - Egyptian blue. Binding mediums are mainly casein and some egg tempera. Pigments include azurite, malchite, cinnabar, haematite, realgar, orpiment and yellow ochre. |
| Fermenting some Tibetan madder roots |
A variety of root madder as pigment
| These three Chroma Panels show natural and mineral pigments without the addition of white in a variety of arrangements. The aim is to show that any arrangement will produce a colour space that is harmonious. |
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| Levigation techniques are taught in detail at my New York workshops. |