Art prof featured on DVD about tempera painting

9:57 a.m., Dec. 14, 2005--“Breaking Eggs: Making Paint,” a Brandywine River Museum-produced DVD about egg-tempera painting, features Hilton Brown, Harriet T. Baily Professor of Art, Art History, Art Conservation and Museum Studies.

Going back in history, Brown demonstrates the methods of egg-tempera painting described by Cennino Cennini in his 14th-Century manuscript, Il Libro Dell’Art. On the DVD, Brown is shown at a lumber yard, where he selects poplar panels, and then is photographed with the free-range chickens that laid the eggs he purchases (grocery store egg yolks are just as good, he confided) for his paint-making.

Making the egg-tempera paint is almost like a TV cooking demonstration, with Brown measuring and mixing, heating and straining his ingredients and preparing pigments.

Next, he prepares the poplar panel and canvas to achieve a completely smooth surface and then uses tempera paints to reconstruct a part of a 14th-Century painting by Simone Martini of a man’s head against a background of gold leaf.

As specified in Cennini’s book and shown on the DVD cover, Brown used mussel shells to hold the different colors he mixed. “They’re the perfect size and work well,” Brown said.

Brown, who is a specialist in the history of materials and the techniques of Western art, said that the DVD demonstrates that materials and techniques are inseparable in creating artwork.

Hilton Brown, Harriet T. Baily Professor of Art, Art History, Art Conservation and Museum Studies

The DVD concludes with an interview with artist Andrew Wyeth, who is famed for his contemporary egg-tempera paintings. Against the background of his painting of a chained coon dog, Wyeth discusses his methods and how he slowly “builds” a painting, sometimes using a palette knife to achieve the desired effect. Egg tempera painting provides a “beautiful surface that is a joy to look at,” Wyeth said.

“Breaking Eggs” is a sequel to a soundless film made in conjunction with a 2002 Brandywine River Museum exhibition, “Milk and Eggs: The American Revival of Tempera Painting, 1930-1950.” Brown was coauthor of the catalog for that exhibition.

"Breaking Eggs" was supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts, and copies have been given to major art museums and research libraries in the United States. The DVD was produced by Teleduction Inc., owned by UD alum Sharon Baker, AS '73, edited by UD alum Julie Pfeifenroth, AS '93, and filmed mostly in Brown's teaching studios in Old College. It is available for purchase at the Brandywine River Museum or through its web site at [www.brandywinemuseum.org].

Article by Sue Moncure
Photo by Kathy F. Atkinson

E-mail this article

Subscribe to UDaily