{"id":6048,"date":"2019-02-21T08:00:08","date_gmt":"2019-02-21T08:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/?p=6048"},"modified":"2020-01-19T19:57:05","modified_gmt":"2020-01-19T19:57:05","slug":"glorious-beauty-gilding-art-origin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/glorious-beauty-gilding-art-origin\/","title":{"rendered":"The Glorious Beauty of Gilding Art: Origin"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Gilding<\/strong><\/em>, and Leaf Gilding<\/strong> specifically, is one of the most luxurious ancient crafting techniques<\/strong>. It is a decorative<\/strong> technique in which master artisans<\/strong> apply a very thin coating of metal<\/strong>, usually gold<\/strong>, to solid surfaces such as metal, wood<\/strong>, porcelain<\/strong>, or stone<\/strong>. A gilded object<\/strong> is also known as gilt<\/strong>. Metal is the most common surface to be gilded. In the West, silver was often used in several objects, however, in China, bronze gilding<\/strong> was more frequent.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Photo: \u00a9Harp Spectrum<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Gilding gives an object a golden appearance<\/strong> without making it cost as much as a solid gold object. In addition, a solid gold piece would often be too soft or too heavy for practical use. A gilt surface also does not tarnish as silver does.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Fox Hunter in Tricorn Hat (20th century). Photo: \u00a91stdibs<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Partial gilt objects are only gilded over part of their surfaces. This may mean that all of the inside, and none of the outside, of a chalice or similar vessel is gilded, or that patterns<\/strong> or images<\/strong> are made up by using a combination of gilded and ungilded areas.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Gilded Egyptian Mask. Photo: \u00a9The Museum of Fine Arts (Houston)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Herodotus mentions that the Egyptians gilded wood<\/strong> and metals<\/strong>, and those artifacts can be found in archeological explorations. Some Ancient Greek statues<\/strong> of great prestige were chryselephantine<\/strong>: made of gold<\/strong> (for the clothing) and ivory<\/strong> (for the flesh). These were created with sheets of gold<\/strong> over a timber<\/strong> framework.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Chryselephantine statue by Carrier-Belleuse. Photo: \u00a9Live Journal<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n\"The

Detail of the Chryselephantine statue. Photo: \u00a9Live Journal<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Impressive ornamental gilding<\/strong> was also used in the ceiling of the Propylaea. There are records that say the first gilding<\/strong> seen at Rome was after the destruction of Carthage, under censorship, when the Romans began to gild the ceilings of their temples and palaces. The Capitol<\/strong> was the first place on which this process was used.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Iowa State Capitol. Photo: \u00a9Manetti<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

However, everyone wanted a piece of that luxury<\/strong> so quickly, private and poor people, gilded their walls, vaults, and other parts of their homes. Due to the thickness of the gold leaf<\/strong> used in ancient gilding<\/strong>, the traces of it that remain are remarkably brilliant and solid. Fire-gilding<\/strong> of metal goes back at least to the 4th century BC, and was known to Pliny, Vitruvius and in the Early Medieval period to Theophilus.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Jakki Godfrey, a contract objects conservator, uses a special solution to remove dirt, grime, and copper corrosion from 210-year-old pillars from the Pierr-Philippe Thomire surtout de table. Photo: \u00a9Cooper Hewitt<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

In Europe, silver-gilt<\/strong> was always more common than gilt-bronze<\/strong>, but in China the opposite was the case. The ancient Chinese<\/strong> also developed the gilding<\/strong> of porcelain<\/strong>, which was later taken up by the French and other European potters.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Wine cooler for half bottles, 1754. (Royal Collection Trust). Photo: \u00a9The French Porcelain Society<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

By the nineteenth century the mercury-gilding<\/strong> process had remained effectively unchanged for over one and a half thousand years, but it became obsolete due to the introduction of galvanic gilding<\/strong>. Nevertheless, the extinction of mercury or fire-gilding was not sorrowed, because the poisonous fumes released during the process were a health threat not only to the workers, but also to those living in the neighborhood of any gilding workshop<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Sword Hilt ( 1881\u201382) designed and modeled by Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse. Created by the goldsmith Lucien Falize. Photo: \u00a9Met Museum<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Theophilus, who wrote in the twelfth century, already knew of the risks inherent to the procedure, yet concern over these only truly appeared massively when the Society of Arts<\/strong> in England offered a prize in 1771, followed shortly by the Acad\u00e9mie des Sciences<\/strong> in Paris, for a solution that would reduce the risks of fire-gilding. Despite what one might think, it wasn\u2019t public concern, but technological advance<\/strong> which brought an end to the use of amalgam in gilding.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

Panther Sculpture gilded with gold leaf and with eyes in swarovski crystals. Photo: \u00a91stdibs<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Until then, fire-gilding was really widespread in Europe and Asia for at least 1 500 years. It was afterwards replaced by electroplating<\/strong>. The origins<\/strong> of gilding as the application of a layer of gold to the surface of a less rare metal go back at least 5 000 years, to the beginning of the third millennium B.C.<\/p>\n

Leaf Gilding<\/strong> in specific is a time-consuming technique<\/strong> and despite water gilding<\/strong> being one of the most difficult methods, it remains unchanged for hundreds of years. Thanks to it wonderful masterpieces<\/strong> were born, from statues to frames. Gustav Klimt<\/strong> is one of the most celebrated artists<\/strong> who incorporated this technique into his paintings<\/strong>, evoking Renaissance.<\/p>\n

\n\"The

\u201cPortrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer\u201d by Gustav Klimt. Photo: \u00a9Vogue<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Gold Leaves<\/strong> are created from gold that is hammered into thin sheets by goldbeating<\/strong>, then they will be used for gilding. The most commonly used gold is 22 karat yellow gold, while pure gold is 24. Even though gold leaf is a metal leaf<\/strong>, usually the term metal leaf is used while referring to other metals.<\/p>\n

Stay with us to learn more about this fascinating ancient art<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

See More Related Stories<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Secrets of the Precious Filigree Art: Origin<\/a><\/p>\n

The Best of Collectible Design by Barbara Nanning<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gilding, and Leaf Gilding specifically, is one of the most luxurious ancient crafting techniques. It is a decorative technique in which master artisans apply a very thin coating of metal, usually gold, to solid surfaces such as metal, wood, porcelain,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":6066,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[2971,2965,2943,2960,2952,2953,1676,154,2027,1088,2947,2964,2954,11,1246,2951,2972,2961,2968,2946,1690,2994,2995,2969,2945,1016,2948,258,2957,2975,2950,2996,2042,15,2955,2944,2959,33,2967,2204,2962,2974,2958,1301,2966,2949,2963,2970,2205,2956,2973,110],"class_list":["post-6048","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-crafts","tag-academie-des-sciences","tag-ancient-chinese","tag-ancient-crafting-techniques","tag-ancient-gilding","tag-ancient-greek","tag-ancient-greek-statues","tag-ancient-technique","tag-ancient-techniques","tag-art-and-craft","tag-artisan","tag-bronze-gilding","tag-bronze-gilt","tag-chryselephantine","tag-craftsmanship","tag-decorative-arts","tag-egyptians","tag-electroplating","tag-fire-gilding","tag-galvanic-gilding","tag-gilded-piece","tag-gilding","tag-gilding-art","tag-gilding-metal","tag-gilding-workshop","tag-gilt","tag-gold","tag-gold-gilding","tag-gold-leaf","tag-gold-sheets","tag-goldbeating","tag-golden-piece","tag-gustav-klimt","tag-hand-craft","tag-handmade","tag-ivory","tag-leaf-gilding","tag-luxury-piece","tag-master-artisans","tag-mercury-gilding","tag-metal","tag-metal-gilding","tag-metal-leaf","tag-ornamental-gilding","tag-porcelain","tag-porcelain-gilding","tag-silver-gilding","tag-silver-gilt","tag-society-of-arts","tag-stone","tag-timber","tag-water-gilding","tag-wood"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6048","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6048"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6048\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12781,"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6048\/revisions\/12781"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.covetfoundation.com\/events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}