Gesso Dust Question

[Bill Rietveldt]

I'm a new member working on my second egg tempera painting from tubes. I decided to try the real thing.

I love processes - so I have made some gessoed panels and started scraping the first one smooth.

So I have all this gesso dust - and I was wondering can I reuse the dust in my next batch of gesso?

While I was searching through the topics I came across Phil S's technique of using a hardwood block dipped in water. I'll try that on the next panel and maybe my nagging reuse and recycle conscience won't have to be satisfied after all.

[David McKay]

Hi Bill:

I had to respond to your post because your comments regarding your nagging desire to recycle and reuse sounded all too familiar to me. In fact, I would call my similiar "conscience", more of an urgency!

Well, I have had the same thoughts regarding all that nice white dust that is simply too good to throw away. I recall mixing it up with a little water quite a few years ago and filling in some cracks in the gessoed panel that occured upon drying. The cracks resulted from too strong a mixture. It seemed to work ok for that purpose, although getting the proper gesso strength from the outset is much preferable.

I don't know what the drying and rehydrating would do for the strength of this material. I would imagine that it is similar to the gesso mixtures that you can buy that already have the glue present and only require water to use. I use to use the grumbacher gesso product with the glue already in it, but found that when I made the gesso from scratch it turned out much better.

I have often wondered about the type of personalitys that the egg tempera medium attracts. I wash out my empty egg shells and grind them up for plant food.

Good luck with your new found medium. Thanks for posting. David

[Bill Rietveldt]

Hi David

Thanks for the reply. I just went over a second panel with a damp hardwood block. That seems to knock down any ridges really quickly and sanding or scraping will be minimal.

Thanks for the tip about egg shells.

As far as personalities - it's great to use a medium that doesn't stink up the room during application or cleanup and doesn't foul the environment with discarded tubes, solvents and chemicals!

By the way while researching egg tempera I came across your work - it's wonderful - your imagery and use of light made me want to find out more about the medium.