Stained Glass Work: A text-book for students and workers in glass

The way in which the painting is attached to the glass and made permanent is by firing it in a kiln at great heat, and thus fusing the two together.

Simple enough to say, but who is to describe in writing this process in all its forms? For there is, perhaps, nothing in the art of stained-glass on which there is greater diversity of opinion and diversity of practice than this matter of firing. But let us make a beginning by saying that there are, it may be said, three chief modifications of the process.

First, the use of the old, closed, coke or turf kiln.

Second, of the closed gas-kiln.

And third, of the open gas-kiln.

The first consists of a chamber of brick or terra-cotta, in which the glass is placed on a bed of powdered whitening, on iron plates, one above another like shelves, and the whole enclosed in a chamber where the heat is raised by a fire of coke or peat.

This, be it understood, is a slow method. The heat increases gradually, and applies to the glass what the kiln-man calls a "good, soaking heat." The meaning of this expression, of course, is that the gradual heat gives time for the glass and the pigment to fuse together in a natural way, more likely to be good and permanent in its results than a process which takes a twentieth part of the time and which therefore (it is assumed) must wrench the materials more harshly from their nature and state.

There are, it must be admitted, one or two things to be said for this view which require answering.

First, that this form of kiln has the virtue of being old; for in such a thing as this, beyond all manner of doubt, was fired all the splendid stained-glass of the Middle Ages.

Second, that by its use one is entirely preserved from the dangers attached to the misuse of the gas-kiln.

But the answers to these two things are—

First, that the method employed in the Middle Ages did not invariably ensure permanence. Any one who has studied stained-glass must be familiar with cases in which ancient work has faded or perished.

The second claim is answered by the fact, I think beyond dispute, that all objections to the use of the gas-kiln would be removed if it were used properly; it is not the use of it as a process which is in itself dangerous, but merely the misuse of it. People must be content with what is reasonable in the matter; and, knowing that the gas-kiln is spoken of as the "quick-firing" kiln, they must not insist on trying to fire too quick.

Now I have the highest authority (that of the makers of both kiln and pigment) to support my own conviction, founded on my own experience, in what I am here going to say.

Observe, then, that up to the point at which actual fusion commences—that is, when pigment and glass begin to get soft—there is no advantage in slowness, and therefore none in the use of fuel as against gas—no possible disadvantage as far as the work goes: only it is time wasted. But where people go wrong is in not observing the vital importance of proceeding gently when fusion does commence. For in the actual process of firing, when fusion is about to commence, it is indeed all-important to proceed gently; otherwise the work will "fry," and, in fact, it is in danger from a variety of causes. Make it, then, your practice to aim at twenty to twenty-five minutes, instead of ten or twelve, as the period during which the pigment is to be fired, and regulate the amount of heat you apply by that standard. The longer period of moderate heat means safety. The shorter period of great heat means danger, and rather more than danger.

Fig. 42 is the closed gas-kiln, where the glass is placed in an enclosed chamber; fig. 43 is the open gas-kiln, where the gas plays on the roof of the chamber in which the glass lies; fig. 44 shows this latter. But no written description or picture is really sufficient to make it safe for you to use these gas-kilns. You would be sure to have some serious accident, probably an explosion; and as it is absolutely necessary for you to have instruction, either from the maker or the experienced user of them, it is useless for me to tell lamely what they could show thoroughly. I shall therefore leave this essentially technical part of the subject, and, omitting these details, speak of the few principles which regulate the firing of glass.

Fig. 42.

Fig. 43.

Fig. 44.

And the first is to fire it enough. Whatever pigment you use, and with whatever flux, none will be permanent if the work is under-fired; indeed I believe that under-firing is far more the cause of stained-glass perishing than the use of untrustworthy pigment or flux; although it must always be borne in mind that the use of a soft pigment, which will "fire beautifully" at a low heat, with a fine gloss on the surface, is always to be avoided. The pigment is fused, no doubt; but is it united to the glass? What one would like to have would be a pigment whose own fusing-point was the same, or about the same, as that of the glass itself, so that the surface, at least, of the piece of glass softens to receive it and lets it right down into itself. You should never be satisfied with the firing of your glass unless it presents two qualifications: first, that the surface of the glass has melted and begun to run together; and second, that the fused pigment is quite glossy and shiny, not the least dull or rusty looking, when the glass is cool.

"What one would like to have."

And can you not get it?

Well, yes! but you want experience and constant watchfulness—in short, "rule of thumb." For every different glass differs in hardness, and you never know, except by memory and constant handling of the stuff, exactly what your materials are going to do in the kiln; for as to standardising, so as to get the glass into any known relation with the pigment in the matter of fusing, the thing has never, as far as I know, been attempted. It probably could not be done with regard to all, or even many, glasses—nor need it; though perhaps it might be well if a nearer approach to it could be achieved with regard to the manufacture of the lighter tinted glasses, the "whites" especially, on which the heads and hands are painted, and where consequently it is of such vital importance that the painting should have careful justice done to it, and not lose in the firing through uncertainty with regard to conditions.

Nevertheless, if you observe the rule to fire sufficiently, the worst that can happen is a disappointment to yourself from the painting having to an unnecessary extent "fired away" in the kiln. You must be patient, and give it a second painting; and as to the "rule of thumb," it is surprising how one gets to know, by constant handling the stuff, how the various glasses are going to behave in the fire. It was the method of the Middle Ages which we are so apt to praise, and there is much to be said for practical, craftsmanly experience, especially in the arts, as against a system of formulas based on scientific knowledge. It would be a pity indeed to get rid of the accidental and all the delight which it brings, and we must take it with its good and bad.

The second rule with regard to the question of firing is to take care that the work is not "stale" when it goes into the kiln. Every one will tell you a different tale about many points connected with glass, just as doctors disagree in every affair of life. In talking over this matter of keeping the colour fresh—even talking it over with one's practical and experienced friends generally—one will sometimes hear the remark that "they don't see that delay can do it much harm;" and when one asks, "Can it do it any good?" the reply will be, "Well, probably it would be as well to fire it soon;" or in the case of mixing, "To use it fresh." Now, if it would be "as well"—which really means "on the safe side"—then that seems a sufficient reason for any reasonable man.

But indeed I have always found it one of the chiefest difficulties with pupils to get them to take the most reasonable precautions to make quite sure of anything. It is just the same with matters of measurement, although upon these such vital issues depend. How weary one gets of the phrase "it's not far out"—the obvious comment of a reasonable man upon such a remark, of course, being that if it is out at all it's, at any rate, too far out. A French assistant that I had once used always to complain of my demanding (as he expressed it) such "rigorous accuracy." But there are only two ways—to be accurate or inaccurate; and if the former is possible, there is no excuse for the latter.

But as to this question of freshness of colour, which is of such paramount importance, I may quote the same authority I used before—that of the maker of the colour—to back my own experience and previous conviction on the point, which certainly is that fresh colour, used the same day it is ground and fired the same day it is used, fires better and fires away less than any other.

The facts of the case, scientifically, I am assured, are as follows. The pigment contains a large amount of soft glass in a very fine state of division, and the carbonic acid, which all air contains (especially that of workshops), will immediately begin to enter into combination with the alkalis of the glass, throw out the silica, and thus disintegrate what was brought together in the first instance when the glass was made. The result of this is that this intruder (the carbonic acid) has to be driven out again by the heat of the kiln, and is quite likely to disturb the pigment in every possible way in the process of its escape. I have myself sometimes noticed, when some painted work has been laid aside unusually long before firing, some white efflorescence or crystallisation taking place and coming out as a white dust on the painted surface.

Now it is not necessary to know here, in a scientific or chemical sense, what has actually taken place. Two things are evident to common sense. One, that the change is organic, and the other that it is unpremeditated; and therefore, on both grounds, it is a thing to avoid, which indeed my friend's scientific explanation sufficiently confirms. It is well, therefore, on all accounts to paint swiftly and continuously, and to fire as soon as you can; and above all things not to let the colour lie about getting stale on the palette. Mix no more for the day than you mean to use; clean your palette every day or nearly so; work up all the colour each time you set your palette, and do not give way to that slovenly and idle practice that is sometimes seen, of leaving a crust of dry colour to collect, perhaps for days or weeks, round the edge of the mass on your palette, and then some day, when the spirit moves you, working this in with the rest, to imperil the safety of your painting.

How to Know when the Glass is Fired Sufficiently.—This is told by the colour as it lies in the kiln—that is, in such a kiln that you can see the glass; but who can describe a colour? You have nothing for this but to buy your experience. But in kilns that are constructed with a peephole, you can also tell by putting in a bright iron rod or other shining object and holding it over the glass so as to see if the glass reflects it. If the pigment is raw it will (if there is enough of it on the glass to cover the surface) prevent the piece of glass from reflecting the rod; but directly it is fired the pigment itself becomes glossy, and then the surface will reflect.

This is all a matter of practice; nothing can describe the "look" of a piece of glass that is fired. You must either watch batch after batch for yourself and learn by experience, or get a good kiln-man to point out fired and unfired, and call your attention to the slight shades of colour and glow which distinguish one from the other.

On Taking the Glass out of the Fire.—And so you take the glass out of the fire. In the old kilns you take the fire away from the glass, and leave the glass to cool all night or so; in the new, you remove it and leave it in moderate heat at the side of the kiln till it is cool enough to handle, or nearly cold. And then you hold it up and look at it.

CHAPTER VIII

The Second Painting—Disappointment with Fired Work—A False Remedy—A Useful Tool—The Needle—A Resource of Desperation—The Middle Course—Use of the Finger—The Second Painting—Procedure.

And when you have looked at it, as I said just now you should do, your first thought will be a wish that you had never been born. For no one, I suppose, ever took his first batch of painted glass out of the kiln without disappointment and without wondering what use there is in such an art. For the painting when it went in was grey, and silvery, and sharp, and crisp, and firm, and brilliant. Now all is altered; all the relations of light and shade are altered; the sharpness of every brush-mark is gone, and everything is not only "washed out" to half its depth, but blurred at that. Even if you could get it, by a second painting, to look exactly as it was at first, you think: "What a waste of life! I thought I had done! It was right as it was; I was pleased so far; but now I am tired of the thing; I don't want to be doing it all over again."

Well, my dear reader, I cannot tell you a remedy for this state of things—it is one of the conditions of the craft; you must find by experience what pigment, and what glass, and what style of using them, and what amount of fire give the least of these disappointing results, and then make the best of it; and make up your mind to do without certain effects in glass, which you find are unattainable.

There is, however, one remedy which I suppose all glass-painters try, but eventually discard. I suppose we have all passed through the stage of working very dark, to allow for the firing-off; and I want to say a word of warning which may prevent many heartaches in this matter. I having passed through them all, there is no reason why others should. Now mark very carefully what follows, for it is difficult to explain, and you cannot afford to let the sense slip by you.

I told you that a film left untouched would always come out as a black patch against work that was pierced with the scrub, however slightly.

Now, herein lies the difficulty of working with a very thick matt; for if it is thick enough on the cheek and brow of a face to give strong modelling when fired, then whenever it has passed over the previous outline-painting, for example, in the eyes, mouth, nostrils, &c., you will find that the two together have become too thick for the scrub to move.

Now you do not need, as an artist, to be told that it is fatal to allow any part of your painting to be thus beyond your control; to be obliged to say, "It's too dark, but unfortunately I have no tools that will lighten it—it will not yield to the scrub."

However, a certain amount can be done in this direction by using, on the shadows that are just too strong for the scrub, a tool made by grinding down on sandpaper a large hog-hair brush, and, of these, what are called stencil-brushes are as good as any (fig. 45).

You do not use this by dragging it over the glass as you drag a scrub, but by pricking the whole of the surface which you wish to lighten. This will make little pinholes all over it, which will be sufficient to let the patch of shadow gently down to the level of the surrounding lighter modelling, and will prevent your dark shadows looking like actual "patches," as we described them doing a little way back.

Fig. 45.

Further than this you cannot go: for I cannot at all see how the next process I am to describe can be a good one, though I once thought, as I suppose most do, that it would really solve the difficulty. What I allude to is the use of the needle.

Of Work Etched out with a Needle.—The needle is a very good and useful tool for stained glass, in certain operations, but I am now to speak of it as being used over whole areas as a substitute for the scrub, in order to deal with a matt too dense for the scrub to penetrate.

The needle will, to be sure, remove such a matt; that is to say, will remove lines out of it, quite clear and sharp, and this, too, out of a matt so dense, that what remains does not fire away much in the kiln. Here is a tempting thing then! to have one's work unchanged by the fire! And if you could achieve this without changing the character of the work for the worse, no doubt this method would be a very fine thing. But let me trace it step by step and try to describe what happens.

You have painted your outline and you put a very heavy matt over it.

Peril No. 1.—If your matt is so dense that it will not fire off, it must very nearly approach the point of density at which it will fry. How then about the portions of it which have been painted on, as I have said, over another layer of pigment in the shape of the outline? Here is a danger. But even supposing that all is safe, and that you have just stopped short of the danger point. You have now your dense, rich, brown matt, with the outline just showing through it. Proceed to model it with the needle. The first stroke will really frighten you; for a flash of silver light will spring along after the point of the needle, so dazzling in contrast to the extreme dark of the matt that it looks as if the plate had been cut in two, while the matt beside it becomes pitch-black by contrast. Well, you go on, and by putting more strokes, and reducing the surrounding darkness generally, you get the drawing to look grey—but you get it to look like a grey pen-drawing or etching, not like a painting at all. We will suppose that this seems to you no disadvantage (though I must say, at once, that I think it a very great one); but now you come to the deep shadows; and these, I need hardly say, cut themselves out, more than ever, like dark patches or blots, in the manner already spoken of. You try pricking it with the brush I have described for that operation, and it will not do it; then you resort to the needle itself, and you are startled at the little, hard, glittering specks that come jumping out of the black shadow at each touch. You get a finer needle, and then you sharpen even that on the hone; and perhaps then, by pricking gingerly round the edges of the shadows, you may get the drawing and modelling to melt together fairly well. But beware! for if there is one dot of light too many, the expression of the head goes to the winds. Let us say that such a thing occurs; you have pricked one pinhole too many round the corner of the mouth.

What can you do?

You take your tracing-brush and try to mend it with a touch of pigment; and so on, and so on; till you timidly say (feeling as if you had been walking among egg-shells for the last hour), "Well, I think it will do, and I daren't touch it any more." And supposing by these means you get a head that looks really what you wanted; the work is all what glass-painters call "rotten"; liable to flake off at the least touch; isolated bits of thick crust, cut sheer out from each other, with clear glass between.