Cyclopedia of Painting/Graining—Pollard and Knotted Oak
POLLARD AND KNOTTED OAK GRAINING
The distemper or water color method for ordinary oak graining has little to recommend it. For graining in imitation of pollard oak, however, this method is invaluable. Pollard, or rather pollarded, oak belongs to the same natural class of oak as the ordinary figured variety. Its sticking appearance is brought about by combined artificial and natural means. When a young oak tree has its branches lopped off, and provided that loppings take place at intervals of a few years, the wood that comes from the mature tree will show clusters of knots—gnarled and twisted grain, with intervening spaces of plainer grain—in which condition it is known as pollard oak. The importance of working from and studying natural specimens of this wood cannot be too strongly emphasized, and really good imitations cannot be executed without such previous study.
The brushes required for this imitation are a large thick mottler, a large sash tool such as that used for overgraining oak, the badger softener, a piece of old open sponge, a wash-leather, medium and small round fitches, sable pencil, and sable overgrained in tube. The ground color should be made from white-lead, ochre, a little Venetian red, and, when the graining is to be quiet, a little burnt umber.
A recipe for pollard oak ground is to mix together 2 parts of ochre, 2 parts of orange chrome, 1 part of Venetian red, 1 part of burnt umber, 20 parts of white-lead, and 2 parts of patent driers, and to thin for use with equal parts of raw linseed oil and turpentine.
In imitating pollard oak, there are two slightly different methods of treatment, the first aiming at reproducing the general effect of the wood in a broad and natural manner on a buff oak ground, and the other aiming at a conventional appearance, the ground being made for a warm and rich final tone, such as the real wood acquires as the result of polishing and age. In the latter treatment, the plain
Fig. 32. Wiping Out Figure in Oak Graining.
and knotty features of the grain are more distinctly separated and the details are shown more minutely. Mix some Vandyke brown with beer in one vessel and some burnt sienna with beer in another vessel. With the large sash tool rub the sienna wash into the panel, which should then be dabbed and rolled with a damp washleather,
Fig. 33. Oak Panel Figured and Overgrained.
to give an irregular but connected mottle. This mottle is at once softened by the badger into stronger but softer masses. Put in clusters of knots, which should have an open appearance, with a stiff round fitch dipped into Vandyke brown and blue-black mixed with beer. When, in a few minutes, this is dry, pass the mottler, dipped in clean,
Fig. 34. Wiping Out Sap in Oak Graining.
cold water, over the work, and, with the sable overgrainer charged with Vandyke brown wash, put in fine grain which crosses more or less irregularly the plain spaces between the knots. When a few lines of grain have been done, each one is softened by the badger to a dark edge, and when all
Fig. 35. Oak Panel Finished.
have been so treated, the numerous fine veins that cross the fainter cross grain and work from knot to knot, are painted in black with a sable pencil. When the work has been varnished or coated with a mixture of equal parts of japan, gold size and turpentine, it is ready for the final glazing or overshading.
This glazing is a similar process to the first mottling, but a weak beer wash of fine blue-black is used instead of burnt sienna. The wash having been well brushed over the panel, the sharp lights amongst the knots are wiped out with the leather, which is then rolled over the work in such a manner as to give more depth and transparency. If these instructions are carefully followed a rich and natural woody effect will be obtained, and a panel so treated is an admirable foil to the maiden oak stiles of a door. The work, after it has been coated with copal varnish and allowed to stand untouched for a few days, is ready for flatting or felting down with finest pulverized pumice-stone, rubbed with felt and water. Finally, a good coat of carriage copal varnish gives a finish that will last, with occasional re-varnishing for many years.
Another imitation of pollard oak, based on the same principle as that just described, is obtained by slightly different means. The ground, which is rich and warm, has a strong wash of burnt sienna rubbed in. The dark masses of knots are dabbed in with a sponge dabbed in the Vandyke wash and also slightly into the blue-black; the connecting touches of dark color are also put in. The color surrounding the knots is now worked with the mottler in one direction; use the brush at right angles to the board, and get one natural lead across the plain spaces from one nest to another. The graining surrounding and amongst the knots is worked with the round stiff fitch into the same natural curves indicated by the mottler; any knots that appear too spotty or set are opened with the fitch. When the work is dry, wet it with beer and proceed to overgrain, using the thin overgrainer charged with a thin Vandyke wash and separated into divisions. Soften the grain to a dark edge, and put in with a sable pencil dipped in a blue-black wash the fine markings which cross the grain. The varnishing or binding coating is now given, and the work
Fig. 36. Pollard Oak Graining—First Stage.
glazed with Vandyke brown, if desired full and rich, or with blue-black if the warmth requires to be toned. If beer is used with the pigments, the work can always be safely wetted to ascertain the color when varnished. Any slight alterations or additions can therefore easily be executed by rewetting parts that may have dried too quickly.
Pollard oak in oil is grained similarly to that in water. To execute pollard oak in oil, the colors required are umber, Vandyke brown and raw sienna, ground to a paste in boiled
Fig. 37. Pollard Oak Graining—Second Stage.
oil, placed on separate palettes, and thinned for use with turpentine. With a large hog-hair tool or a sponge, give a thin coat of burnt sienna over all the work, and before it is dry dapple it over in various directions with the prepared colors, putting plenty of color where the knots are to be shown. The best tool for this purpose is a well-worn flat mottler, having a thin, uneven row of hairs, and it should be dipped first in one color and then in another. To form the knots, dip the brush into the burnt umber made thin with turpentine. The knots can be further shaped by taking out the lights with a brush moistened with turpentine. Small fitches rinsed in turpentine will take out sharp lights. When this color is set, put on in a curly direction a thin glaze of burnt umber. There must be enough oil in the color to bind and keep it open so that it may be easily worked. The softener must be liberally used. A cork is sometimes useful for forming knots on the dark part of the color, and it should be twisted with the finger and thumb to give the light and shade. The heart and sap of the wood should be taken out with a fitch, in the same way as for light oak, but there is not much of the ordinary figure in pollard oak. A flat graining brush, well filled with thin black, will produce the top grain in a curly form, and finally the work should be glazed with Vandyke brown, with a touch either of black or of burnt sienna. The knots and dark parts may be finished with a camel-hair pencil. The glazing may be done either in oil-color or water-color. If done in oil, the lights can be wiped out with rag. The color is made up of Vandyke brown, with a little burnt sienna or black, according as warm or cold tones are required. Really, final glazing is the same as in the distemper process, except that the colors do not require binding.
Root of oak is similar to pollard oak. The grain, however, instead of flowing from each set of knots, encircles the masses of knots in irregular rings of overgrain, and the dark pencil veins are more in evidence.
Knotted oak, so called, combines the knotted and figured portions of the wood. It is often employed, when graining oak in oil, for the panels, with ordinary oak stiles. It has a warm buff ground, containing a dash of umber, whilst for the graining color the best burnt Turkey umber is used. The color is rubbed in, and one side of the panel combed, while on the other side the dark knots are put in by means of a stiff titch dipped in umber and drier. With another fitch give these knots and the surrounding space a growing motion towards the other half of the panel. Now put in the fine lights across the slightly combed half with a lead towards the knots, and then work up the knotted half with a pencil and rag. When this is dry, overgrain with a distemper wash of Vandyke brown.