Is there any trick that you know of correcting a small mark in a gongbi painting

[罗雁 LuoYan]

Is there any trick that you know of correcting a small mark in a gongbi painting?

• Ce sujet a été modifié le il y a 7 années et 8 mois par 罗雁 LuoYan.

[罗雁 LuoYan]

Yes, there are three main tricks to correct small mark or errors in Gongbi painting.

• You can use warm water to wash carefully. This will not completely remove the stain but it creates a special foggy feeling. Therefore, this is also used as a special painting technique in Chinese painting. For instance, you can use this to paint clouds, flowers, etc.
• Another way to correct mark is to correct it with smashed garlic. Smash the garlic and use it to clean the mark slowly and carefully by hair brush. This will clean the mark completely. Once the mark is gone, use tissue to remove the garlic and absorb the water on the paper. When the paper is dry, apply a layer of alum water on the paper. When the alum water is absorbed and dry, you can paint again.
• Or, if you do not like garlic, you can also replace it with fine ashes of high quality tabaco. This will also help clean the mark completely.

You need a lot of practice to master these tricks. There are also some special chemicals in market and they can clean marks. However, we do not recommend to use them on handmade Xuan papers because the unknown chemicals might destroy the natural fibers in Xuan paper. It might not easy to notice but in long term, the destroyed fibers will make the paper ‘broken’ and also get the colour ‘run off’ the painting.

[Auteur]

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