Framing my 16 Vestal Virgins

I received notice that my Whiter Shade of Pale painting has been adjudicated into an exhibition.  While I am elated about this opportunity I am also concerned that I must now find a proper way to display my painting, and to be able to do that before drop-off day. 

My painting of the 16 Vestal Virgins was done on gold speckled Xuan paper and I chose to wet mount it with a 4 in wide white speckled Xuan border.  I was trying to emulate the classical mounted scroll appearance.  I had stored the painting rolled up in a mailer tube since completion of the work.  The gist of the matter is that I simply can't house all my paintings in a frame; I would simply run out of storage.  Having the painting mounted on paper precludes me from displaying the work as a Sulio Xuan Ban float, or a canvas mount.  The only option left is to present it in a conventional picture frame. 

My mounted painting with borders measures 26in x 46 in and there just aren't any ready made picture frames for that size.  I was able to find a cheap custom made frame shop online that would sell a frame with backing and 060 plexiglass for around $75.  Unfortunately I will need to pay a shipping cost of $50.  Ouch!

My only option left is to make my own picture frame.  I prefer to use 1x2 in. pine stock over my usual poplar for my frame.  I think the natural color of pine will be a perfect match for my gold speckled paper and pine is quite a bit cheaper than poplar.  

I am using my dado blades instead of a router to cut a shoulder into my 1x2 stock.  Using a router would have required securing the skinny 1x2 stock before running the router bit over it whereas I already have a table saw and it is just a matter of changing out the saw blade and run the 1x2 stock through.  A much easier and safer proposition.

Cutting a shoulder into the 1x2 stock

The shaped 1x2 stock is then cut to size, sanded down and glued and finished in clear urethane.  I am not using any stains on the pine stock since I want the natural wood color to match my painting.  I apply several coats of the clear urethane, with steel wool polishing between the coats.

You recall my painting has a 26 in. measurement on one side, yet a standard piece of board for backing comes in at 24 in x 48 in.  That means I am 2 inches shy unless I spring for the next size up, which is 48 in x 96 in.  After some consideration, I trim off one inch of my white speckled border on all 4 sides and that reduced the measurement to 24 in in width.  That means I can now use the standard 24 in x 48 in board for backing.  I am left with a 3 in border, which still looks good on the painting.  I purchase my cut-to-size plexiglass for the cover glass from a local plastic shop.

My frame measures 44 in x 25in. and I am concerned that the pine is a little too flexible for the 44 inch span.  My fear is that people would pick up the painting by the long side of the frame and cause the wood to bow.  I therefore cut and screwed in an anchoring support post in the middle of the frame to help stabilize the frame.  The frame is rock solid now with that bracing. 

I use D-rings for anchoring my picture wire and the cut ends of the multi-strand wire is wrapped in heat-shrink tubing.  I've poked myself and drew blood on the loose strands of a hanging wire thus I am extending the courtesy of shielding other handlers from potential mishap.

Here is the new home for my 16 Vestal Virgins.  I am right about the natural pine being a good match for the paper.  I am happy to say their new home only costs me $50, instead of the the $125 if I had bought it on mail order.  This is not only more economical, but is made with love and looks great.

I am actually doing this as a journal for myself to read in a future date.  I often am amused by how I invite problems by not recognizing them to begin with, and the process and remedies I take to mitigate the road blocks.  

As I look at this finished product, a final step so to speak, a strange emotion overcomes me.  I had stored the painting rolled up in a mailer tube, little thought was given to how to frame it to begin with, if at all.  My thought process just don't extrapolate that far ahead.  Or is it not counting chickens before the eggs are hatched?  Anyways the emotions I am feeling is like my son has surreptitiously grown up and out of the blues he is ready for his first prom night.  He is asking to borrow my tie and my dress shoes because all he has are sneakers.  Thus I am fidgeting with his attire, polishing the shoes for him, taking pictures and beaming with smiles, as a proud father should be.  Making sure that he is presentable to his date, his schoolmates, and the world.  I am so happy that he is growing up, but secretly feeling sentimental that my days of being an empty-nester won't be too far off.  So as the painting that I had spent so much time on, the painting that I have grown attached to, is getting all dolled up, I must however, need to acknowledge the fact that there's a possibility that we might be parting ways?

Wet Mounting

Having experimented with heat mounting with plastic food wrap and failed, I resolved to staying with the traditional wet mount.  The caveat being if I wanted the float effect, then I would go for my proprietary Suliao Xuan Ban method.

I have the "no roof" version of the Korean Maidens that needs mounting.

I had described my Xuliao Xuan Ban method in detail in past posts, so in the interest of allowing equal time, I would describe the process of wet mounting in this blog.

There are some basic tools needed for the wet mounting process, which is in itself quite esoteric, so bear with me.

We need

1. a clean and smooth surface sufficiently large enough for the painted work
2. a hard, dry surface for the mounted work to dry
3. 3 brushes: one for applying starch, one for initial pressing and a more robust one for final pressing
4. starch solution
5. stack of newspaper
6. spray bottle of water
7. clean rags
8. an underlayment paper, typically another piece of  Xaun
9. steady hands and patience

The starch solution can be prepared by mixing regular household all purpose starch in an aqueous solution of alum.  Sometimes a sprinkle of camphor powder is mixed in.   I still don't have a clear understanding of why the alum is needed.  I was told that it helps to ensure color-fasting of the painted work.  The camphor helps to ward off silverfish.  Use the camphor sparingly, as the fumes can be overpowering.  The starch and alum solution should be mixed thoroughly and all lumpiness are eliminated.  We don't want the initial suspension to be too diluted, as we need to add boiling water to this mixture to obtain the starch.

It is a common mistake to thicken this suspension by boiling over a stove, as in gravy making. This will result in too thick a product which is not suitable for mounting purpose.  The trick is to boil a kettle of water, and drizzle that into the starch suspension with constant stirring.  The end stage is revealed by a change of the appearance of the suspension.  It will take on a glistening, translucent look, with a consistency of skim milk.  If your finished product looks pasty, add more boiling water.  This thin starch can be stored in a refrigerator for quite a few months without losing any viability.  The stored suspension will separate.  Fret not, it works just fine by stirring and reconstituting.

I use a porcelain trough for my starch basin, the wide brush is for applying starch.
The red taped brush is for initial pressing, the bubble pack wrapped brush is for final hard pressing.

I used a large piece of Plexiglas (4 ft x 5 ft) as my work surface.  It was thoroughly cleaned with water and alcohol before use.

My Koren Maiden painting laid face-down on the Plexiglas ( notice the maidens are on the left now since we are looking at the backside). Now the entire painting was sprayed with clean water.  This was done to relax the fibers of the Xuan.

This is when patience is needed.  Typically huge bubbles would form and the painting would not be sitting flat on the Plexiglas.  Rather it would appear like a fresh piece of naan bread with the bubbles.
Our natural tendency would be to lift the wet painting and reposition it to assume a flat appearance.
Don't do that, unless of course you want to shred your painting.  The water added weight to the painting; along with the suction that was formed from the two wet surfaces sticking to each other created an ideal formula to form tears.

Wait this out.  As the painting slowly dried it regained its integrity while being relaxed at the same time.  Now we could tenderly lift and manipulate the moist painting to lay flatter on the Plexiglas.  It didn't need to be perfect, as the starch application would even things out.

The broad brush was primed with the starch solution and brushed onto the back of the painting.  Starting at the center of the painting and using firm but appropriate force spread the starch towards the edges and the corners.  Since the brush is made of firm bristles and the starch solution is wet and slimy, the brush actually glided on the backside of the painting with ease, all the while smoothing out and leveling any creases.  Stubborn creases could be eliminated by repeated wetting of more starch and passing over with the brush.

The repeated starch application and passing over the paper caused abrasion to the backside of the Xuan.  This was evidenced by the appearance of clumps of paper fibers.  No worries, these would blend nicely with the starch solution and would not be noticeable in the finished product.

In order to thoroughly apply starch to the backside of the painting, we were over brushing.  Before the next step in the wet mounting process could be done, we must rid any errant starch with a clean wet rag around the edges of the painting.  There shouldn't be any starch other than on the back of the painting.

Now we need to apply the underlayment paper.  The underlayment is typically another piece of Xuan which is similar to the one used for painting.  This piece need to have a border of about 3-4 inches around the painting to be mounted.  The underlayment is folded and creased along the short and long edges of the painting.  This is for the purpose of positioning the underlayment onto the painting.  Since the underlayment is larger than the painting itself, when applied over the back of the painting, we would be covering it in the blind.  Thus we needed some way to know exactly where the painting is.

Thus the folds represent the edges of the painting.  It would be relatively simple to line up the folded edges of the underlayment with the edges of the painting, which is on the Plexiglas, with starch applied to the backside.

Once the edges were lined up, we unfurl the underlayment onto the starched painting, with the help of the smaller red tape brush.  The brush is made of palm fiber bristles and is therefore stiff.  Using rapid up and down strokes the underlayment is brushed onto the starched painting.

The underlayment would begin to take on the starch from the backside of the painting.  It would look moist  and perhaps showing some minor raised ridges from the uneven wetting of the underlayment by the starch.

This is the time to pile on newspaper onto the underlayment.  I would use 3 to 4 layers of the newspaper.  The newspaper served to purpose of soaking up excess moisture, but mainly to protect the underlayment and the painting from the harsh pressing with the palm fiber brush.

I wrapped my brush with bubble wrap to help protect my fingers and my palm.  During the pressing process I would start from the center and press firmly outwards.  The purpose was to press the underlayment firmly onto the starched painting, forcing out any air bubbles and flattening any raised ridges.  The rough fibers could cause blisters to form on my palm and fingers if I didn't shield them properly.

The stiff palm fibers actually flattened out from the exertion of force

This is what a properly pressed and flattened underlayment looked like

So we now had a sandwich of underlayment and starch, with the painting on the bottom, facing down.  Hence it was critical that we wiped off any excess starch because we didn't want this sandwich to stick to the Plexiglas work surface.

Now we applied a judicious amount of starch along the edge of the underlayment, paying utmost attention to avoid the painting itself, which we could discern.

This is a graphic representation of what we had so far

Now lift this completed assembly and move it onto a dry, hard surface.  I used a half-door for my purpose.  So now we would be throwing the assembly right-side-up onto the door, with the starch on the bottom, along the edge of the underlayment.

We fixed the top edge onto the door first, tamping the edge down with the red-taped brush.

move the brush down along the surface of the painting and along the edges

The starch that was applied to the edges of the underlayment held the mounted work in place.  So now we had the painting with the right side out, starched onto a piece of underlayment, which again was starched along the edges and affixed to the door.

This assembly was left to dry.  The slower the drying process, the better would be the result.  The drying shrank the paper, and along with the starch rendered the painting flat and taut.

Remember your starched shirts?  Nice.

So this wet mounting process gave stiffness and provided white balance to the painting.

After complete drying of the assembly, the painting was harvested by lifting the underlayment off the door, or by cutting along the edges of the underlayment.  The oversized underlayment provides a nice place to apply mat tapes if one chooses to display the work with a matted border in a picture frame.

In my hast, or rather, lack of care, I eyeballed my folding positions on the underlayment.  The final result being the painting was not in the middle.  It tilted to the right.

Fortunately I had sufficient border left for the application of starch along tall he edge of the underlayment.  I lucked out.

After careful examination there was only one defect on my mounted painting.  I missed one of the creases and didn't brush it out so it was folding upon itself.  Fortunately the omission was minor and most people would not have noticed.

I have the examples of the wet mount and my dry mounted Suliao Xuan Ban for comparison.
The no-roof version is the wet mount and the roofed version is dry mount.

Presenting Mr. Pig

I decided to mount my Mr. Pig painting and frame it for a proper presentation.  This is the Year Of The Pig after all and due respect must be paid.

I went with my Suliao Xuen Ban method again.  After the Xuan  paper was tailored and mounted to the proper location of the clear plastic, the fun began.

This is going to be a celebratory painting so I need to jazz it up a little bit.  I wanted it to blink a little.  I had some gold glittered Christmas ribbon laying around so I drafted it for my project.  I harvested the glitter by scraping the ribbon with a knife.

I didn't want it to sparkle like a Swarovski  piece, but definitely enough to make it noticeable.  Since the painting depicted a bountiful harvest with the stalks of grain, I applied a heavy sprinkle onto that area to emphasize its presence.

After the application of glitter, I sprayed the the painting and the plastic with Urethane.  The aerosol helped to fix the glitter and rendered the clear border semi-opaque ( newspaper is blurry now in the background).  It also helped to provide additional shielding from the elements.

I built a frame with poplar for the piece and painted it gold to adorn my painting, befitting a regal and auspicious year.   I wanted quiet simplicity and  elegance.  Two holes were drilled on the vertical member of the frame for hanging.  A small hole on the inside for the transparent fishing lines to pass through and a larger one on the back side to hide the knots which secured the fishing line.

The fishing lines were threaded through a short piece of heat-shrink tubing.  This little tube would fit around the lines snugly once a heat source is applied, i.e. with a heat gun or a flame.  I chose to let it ride freely on the lines.  This was meant to be an added protection of the lines from abrasion.  Just an insurance policy against premature breakage from normal wear and tear.

My set up allows the frame to sit perfectly flat against the wall without any tilt.  Fishing line was used such that it is less obtrusive through the semi-opaque border of the plastic piece,  accentuating the float effect of the painting.  I hope to create the illusion that Mr. Pig just appeared in thin air.  He is a diety after all. 

Here is the framed piece.

( NO ) Strings attached

Two of my paintings needed mounting and framing.  They got juried into an exhibition.  One of those was the one I named Oblivious; the "have eyes but won't see" painting.  This was especially uplifting, as I felt vindicated, after being rejected twice by other venues.  I was told by the curator that the reason for rejection was "the faces are not familiar to the west".  I didn't know I was signing up for a course in Bovine Scatology!  On the other hand, it exemplified the caliber of the show!  Might as well!

Again I mounted them in the Suliao Xuan Ban fashion, and again I stained my frames with the same ink I painted with to achieve that tonal continuity between the painting and the frame.

I devised a new method to combat the bubbles that popped up under the paper.  This was probably due to defects in the silicone layer.  I used a stress ball as a roller to help tamp the Xuan onto the heated silicone surface.  The ball was very pliable and made even contact with the surface when pressed.  The added bonus was that I got to massage my acupressure points in my palm (wink, wink).

I modified my hanging string this time.

I had used the regular metal picture wires before for the cross string.  That was until my confidant pointed out to me that the wire was visible through the clear margin that I had painstakingly designed.  My reason for that clear margin ( in lieu of a traditional mat) was to exaggerate the float effect of the painting.  I also wanted to free the painting from the immediate enclosing feeling of the frames.  So after having these thoughts executed into the design of the setup, I ruined it by allowing the viewer to see a metal wire through the acrylic pane. That was more than a fly in the ointment.  This is a mistake that I often make.  I am always in a hurry to finish a project that I would not think through the last few steps.  I will write these steps off as being incidental and trivial and not critical.  I just have no patience; too eager to call it done.  That's the bane of my life.

To make the hanging wire less visible, I thought of the leader system of fishing hooks, harking back to the days when I would ford the streams and fish a little bit.  I would use the regular metal hanging wire, but instead of the entire length, I would tie both ends to clear fishing lines.  This way the clear fishing lines were under the clear acrylic margin, and were not readily visible.  The reason I did not use fishing line for the whole length to begin with was because the length of the wire was too long in the landscape setup.  The weight of the wood frame and the plastic caused the wire to stretch too much, resulting in the hanging hook visible above the frame.  That destroyed the presentation.  I wanted to frame to just appear on the wall, without any obvious means of hanging or attachment.

I drilled a 90 degree angled passage in the narrow wood frame and passed my fishing line through that.  I then tied a huge knot;  one that was big enough to not slip through the tiny hole, thus securing the line.  I then tied the clear fishing line to the metal hanging wire.  The beauty of this design was that no hanging hardware was required, and the hanging hook would be hidden by the painting itself.

This is how the finished product looked on the wall.
 No visible hooks or wires!

Sulio Xuan Ban and Xuan Boo in action

I have mentioned my unique ways of mounting Chinese brush paintings in my blogs.  Xuan-Boo is how I mounted Xuan on canvas.  Suliao Xuan Ban is mounting Xuan on plastic.

I have been labelled as being "gimmicky" by the camp of traditional brush artists.  In my defense, I was motivated by circumstances.

The traditional way of mounting Xuan on paper or silk is great.  Unfortunately, having paintings mounted in a scroll format demands skilled craftsmanship.  There just aren't too many of these floating around when one is in a town where such crafts are rather obscure and esoteric.  I could have mounted the Xuan on paper and present it in a picture frame, but I see two limitations.  The first one being the glass frame imposes a glare, and museum grade non-glare glass is not economical and not often available in the odd sizes.  The second factor is that the painting loses the vivaciousness once dried.  I like the wet look so much better.

When I first fooled around with Xuan-Boo, I was instantly attracted to it.  The texture of the canvas and the color luminosity being restored by applying the protective gel.  The application of gel was to protect the surface of the painting from the usual indoor elements.   I had no idea that it added to the depth of the color.  That truly was serendipity in action.

I really like a lot of the "metallic" prints of photographs and the way they were presented.  No frames, just sort of floated from the wall.  That was my inspiration for devising the Suliao Xuan Ban technique.  I compromised on the absence of frame by creating a clear margin around the painting, allowing it to float on the display wall.

There are ongoing debates about the merits of wet versus dry mounting.  Chinese wet mounting has been the gold standard in the traditional way.  Having done both I would say that a nicely done wet mounting is superior to the dry mounted one.  This is especially apparent when one can hold that piece of work in your hands.  It just feels organic and not mechanical.  A point that the wet mounting camp stresses is that a dry mount is irreversible.  Museums have been know to re-mount a piece of deteriorated ancient work and restore the painting.  This would not be possible with dry mount.  But then again, how many pieces of our works gain immortality?  Of course the main reason for dry mounting is that the execution generally requires less skill, and is definitely not as time consuming.

Some people at the local galleries balk at the idea that the painting is mounted.  They asserted that the painting must retain the flexibility of being  able to be presented in the frame of the customer's choosing.  In other words, the consumer might not like the way I presented it, and would need to replace the frame.  They are in effect paying money for the painting itself and nothing else.

Recently I had a chance to present exclusively my two methods of mounting at an exhibition.  I did that obviously to satisfy my own biases and I really don't expect the audience to know one way or another.
It was gratifying to see how my presentation was so vastly different from everybody else's.

These are paintings done in the Xuan-Boo fashion:

These are done in the Suliao Xuan Ban fashion:

Call me a goofball, call me a gimmick,  I'm just not satisfied with the status quo.