All posts tagged as #sharetheblack

25Mar2018

The most beautiful and blackest pigment, comes from ……

part 1: The most beautiful and blackest pigment, comes from …
part 2 : Coal preparation plant Beringen
part 3 : Artist Residency in old mine building

I talk a lot about paint over here, which I’m making from pigment-ground coal. But what I didn’t told you yet, is with which coal I’m doing all these tests. Not all coal is the same you know. Far from.

From Semple’s Black over coal from Zolder to weird tests with purchased coal.

kibble coal from Zolder - anv.beMy collaboration with Semple’s search for the blackest paint possible for everyone (except Anish Kapoor), was the beginning of my “coalpaint story”. I started experimenting with coal from Zolder. That paint was dark brown. Then I tried anthracite. The result was a neutral black paint. Mixed with Semple’s Black 2.0, it was the blackest existing paint. Until here you were up-to-date.

But I wanted to make the paint more black. The more light something absorbens, the darker it seems. A matt surface absorbens light. But the antracite I used, shines. A shining pigment reflects the light in stead of absorbing it. I should be able to fix that…

tests manipulated coal pigment- AnV.be

Fix it, like in: trying to make the coal mat. For this I did the most idiotic tests: Mixing coal with White Spirit, with turpentine, with Ammonia, with … all unhealthy stinking products, which deprived the coal of its luster. I transformed the matted coal into paint, hoping to get the black paint even blacker. And that worked. The difference between the paint results was by far not as big as the difference between dry pigment, but it was there. A lot of hassle. And really not healthy. Good for a test strip, not for producing.

But because of the color difference between Zolder’s coal and that of the purchased coal …

I became very curious about what color the coal of Beringen would give. Below the washing plant, I could see piles of coal, which I would really like to have. But the site was closed with fences, and there was a warning sign that there’s camera surveillance. Damn.

If there is something that I learned in 2017

then it is, that if I really want something, I just have to dare to ask. The answer is surprisingly often yes, and I am incredibly happy about that.
The rest you can read tomorrow :-), in part 2.

20Jul2017

Blacker than any black acrylic paint so far: Black 2.0 and coal.

A blacker black part 2. As I wrote in part 1, Semple’s coworker asked me if I had already made something with my coal paint. I was working on a few pieces, sent some intermediate pictures and worked like mad to demonstrate outcomes. I managed to finish them a couple of weeks ago.
But it’s difficult to show the result. A photograph does not reflect how dark, how matt that paint is. Therefor I also made videos, but they’ve been made with the same small camera (no reflex). It continuously wants to add light.

Paint with coal from Zolder

AnV - Y3 - 40x40cm studio shot: painting with black 2.0 and coal paintI made this painting with paint I made with coal from the last Belgian coalmine, Zolder; and some Black 2.0. I attached a little ceramic ‘coal vessel’ as in my ceramic Saint Barbara’s. In real life, with moderate light (*) and from a little distant, you don’t see there’s something attached to the canvas, it just seems to be a circle.
I explain which paints I used in the different parts of this canvas, in the video below. Please select the 1080HD quality.
(Click here to watch the video directly in YouTube)

My blackest black piece of art so far

The blackest black acrylic paint on ceramic - Black 2.0 and coal - anv.beis this Saint Barbara, entitled “In the name of my father, my grandfather and their friends” f2/07, Acylics and coal on earthenware, An Vanderlinden, 2017.

You don’t want to know how many hours it took me before it looked like this. Black 2.0 is very matte, and very difficult to ‘enlighten’. The difference between plain acrylic and Black 2.0 is huge. To get transitions between light and dark, I mixed Black 2.0 with plain black paint, and with matte medium. But wet paint is shiny, so the result was never predictable. Layers, lots of layers until I had the desired effect. 

So the “luminous” parts in this work are plain black paint, diluted with ordinary mediums. Only for a few accents I used gloss medium, and some coal on top, but you can see that kind of details in the short video below (Click here to watch the video directly in YouTube – please select the 1080HD quality)


Black. I have a lot to say about it, so to be continued. But not now: I really need to work in my studio.

(*) If you put a spotlight on it, it seems to be grey. So there’s still a lot of work todo before Black 2.0 comes near nanoblack.

18Jun2017

Black! Black! Black! Black I say, Black!

It’s un-be-lievable that it’s sooooo long ago since I wrote about my black, while I’m working on it day and night. Time to bring you up to speed. Well, almost up to speed. Here’s a short version of a few months testing and developing black paint. Part 1 of the story.

My own black pigment, is…

I’ve already revealed in my review of Black 2.0, that I have “my own black pigment”, which is more black then Ivory Black. But I didn’t told you what it was then, time to do that now. My own black pigment is made of … (hold your horses, I’m trying to create some suspense over here)… it… (annoying silence) … is (more annoying silence) … drumroll … … coal!
OK, I admit, you easily could have guessed that one yourself, if you know my work.

Coal from the mine of ZolderI planned for a long time to make paint with coal as a pigment, but it was the arrival of Black 1.0 and Super Base which finally got me into actually doing it. 25 Years ago, I visited the last Belgian coalmine during it’s last months,  and I took ‘some’ coal with me to use in artworks. I still have this coal, but the biggest piece is falling apart. Now I took the small pieces that came of, and grinded them in order to make acrylic paint. With Semple’s Super Base, as well as with ‘regular’ binding agents.

 

black - particles of coalblack paint tests with coal - anvblack coalpaint - anv

The first results where disappointing, but along the way I got myself a beautiful paint. Odd enough, more brown then black. Dark brown. Very dark when I combine layers, but brown.

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07Apr2017

Black 2.0 is here! #ShareTheBlack

OK, I have to admit, I’ve got it a little bit longer then today :) but it’s only recently in the press (lots of Stuart Semple interviews), and I really didn’t had the time to write.
So it arrived, Black 2.0! Stuart Semple used the feedback he received from artists all over the world to improve his Black 1.0 beta, and came with a better, darker, blacker black.
It’s a pre-mixed bottle this time, and his mail said it’s the most pigmented, flattest, mattest, black acrylic paint in the world.
I did some tests the minute my package arrived: made it from the front door to my studio in 0.5 seconds ;-).

Black 2.0 versus Black 1 beta

No comprehensive report this time, instead I made a little movie about a black rabbit:

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16Mar2017

Test results! Come and see. #ShareTheBlack

Tadaaa, here are the results of the tests I did with Stuart Semple’s Black v 1.0 (beta). It’s the most matt, black art material at this moment available for everyone (except for Anish Kapoor).

Blackest Black test – part 1

I started with the beginning (yep, sometimes I do make sense ;-): I mixed the paint. The delivered material consisted out of a box with powder and a bottle with liquid (base). The whole point of this black paint is that base, which is called “SuperBase”. And it IS a Super Base! It takes much more pigment then every other base I tried. But I’m not that thrilled about the delivered black pigment, so I searched for something better.

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26Feb2017

The blackest black, soon in my studio!

Last  year, Anish Kapoor acquired exclusive rights(*) to the “blackest black”, aka Vantablack. Anish who? Great. Forget the man’s name. Vantablack is un-be-lie-vable, it absorbs 99.96% of all light, but he patented it so nobody else except himself can use that black to create art. He patented a colour. What did he made with it so far? A watch. A very, very expensive watch.

Stuart Semple

Stuart Semple's Pinkest PinkThat made the British artist Stuart Semple SO angry, he decided to share the colours he has been developing for himself. He first started to share ‘’The World’s Pinkest Pink”, but in meanwhile he also launched “The World’s yellowest yellow”, the greenest green and the most glittery glitter.
Colours which are also unbelievable, and CAN be used by everybody. Correction: by everybody, except by Anish Kapoor. You can read it everywhere on his web shop: “By adding this product to your cart you confirm that you are not Anish Kapoor, you are in no way affiliated to Anish Kapoor, you are not purchasing this item on behalf of Anish Kapoor or an associate of Anish Kapoor. To the best of your knowledge, information and belief this paint will not make it’s way into the hands of Anish Kapoor.”
So Stuart Semple shares his colours with the whole world, except with that one fucking egoist who doesn’t want to share his black.
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