here we finally have a series of works done with traditional means. it is said that the brothers van eyck were the 'inventors' of oil painting while the truth appears to be that they were bringing secret recipes of 'tempera' to a perfect, non-decaying, non-cracking completion. it further appears that they didn't really paint with oil in the sense that alla prima painters from the impressionists onward did, squeezing them out of the tube. but instead had a recipe for embedding the pigments in resins that could be converted from water based emulsions to oil-based emulsions and vice verse, thereby allowing countless layers of glazing. and alternate layers of chiaro-scuro and colour.
i have tried to understand this procedure in modern terms and also found a way to add wax into the resin, giving it an even more interesting texture. my career as an art teacher being curbed and persecuted as it had been, it now appears that the actual technique will be kept "secret" – in the same way that cultivation related matters have been kept secret for most of mankind's history – but now are not anymore.