How To Repair A Chipped Oil Painting

Repairing cracks in a painting TECHNICAL ADVICE NEEDED

This topic has ten replies, 6 voices, and was final updated 14 years, 10 months agone by TCarl.

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April 18, 2007 at 8:24 am #986402

I stupidly said I would try to repair an oil painting for the female parent of one of my son's friends. She is decorating a new house and she likes the painting, which was stored somewhere cold and damp, simply she doesn't desire to hang it upwardly with the cracks. What she SAID is that she doesn't care if I ruin it- she wants me to try fixing it and if information technology doesn't work I suppose she will just buy a different 1. It is a cityscape and the entire heaven has circular cracks. The other areas of the painting – the buildings and streets etc. are fine. Any advice on the proper style to practise this? I was going to wipe linseed oil over the entire painting, let it sit a day and and then use thick pigment to repaint the affected areas.
Cheers in advance for any help.

Nora

April 18, 2007 at eight:56 am #1084315

Wiping linseed oil over the entire painting is an excellent way to make your painting yellow. Almost your question; when y'all walk into a museum with quondam principal paintings, accept a expect at the ones done on canvas. They're cracked all over the place, and these paintings are in the hands of conservators.. Easy to fix? I don't call up so. Store wine and junk in cellars, not paintings, they don't like.

April 18, 2007 at 9:20 am #1084316

I will post a picture show of the painting afterwards. I am not thinking information technology will be easy but I retrieve I can brand it look Meliorate. I ti snot an old primary. It smells of mildew and she only likes the colors I suppose. She'll pay me $l to brand the cracks go abroad but the frame information technology is in is worth more than than the painting IMO.
Anyone else? I vaguely remember hearing you could rub a raw spud over the entire painting before reworking information technology- although I am not certain why….there appears to be no varnish on the matter. information technology has a very matte advent.

April 18, 2007 at 10:49 am #1084313

Circular cracks like you describe can be impact cracks. These are caused by someone poking a foot or some object into the canvas which then shatters the brittle paint layer into spiral cracks. The potatoe that you refer to is sometimes used equally a degreaser when there has been an glut of oil and new layers don't desire to stick to such an oily surface-a potatoe slice will degrease the surface and cause other layers to be accepted. It doesn't accept anything to practise with repairing bear upon cracks.
Exercise you really want to spend a few hundred hours to repair this? Filling the cracks, resurfacing so matching paint colors in hue, value, chroma and of grade sheen?

April 18, 2007 at 8:24 pm #1084311

Here is something you lot may effort… allowing for the fact that information technology may ruin the painting unless carefully watched.
https://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=406956

Mike Finn

Apr 19, 2007 at half-dozen:41 am #1084309

Just put Nora you can't repair cracks in oil paintings. Professionally they mask their appearance, as well as trying to stabilize the back up to minimise future problems but they don't fix the cracks.

Einion

April 19, 2007 at 10:33 am #1084317

OK, Einion, I need to re-word this. Is there a way to camouflage and or hibernate the cracks in the original oil so that it will await expert for another 4-five years?

My plan is to repaint the entire sky with thicker paint. It is the but part of the painting that is cracked at all. the other parts seem to have a thicker application of pigment. I am pretty good at mixing paint and matching tints and as the sky is gray I shouldn't have besides many problems. Information technology won't be the "original" just the woman likes it for the colors in it. (IT Volition NOT take me a hundred hours, kazucks- I predict it volition take two hours)

I know you all are trying to convince me I should not attempt this simply she truly hates it the way it is and will throw it out if it doesn't work so I have nothing to lose and maybe if I mess information technology up I can buy the frame off her. Or sell her some other painting.

All kidding aside– is there some special substance I should apply earlier I try this? Sand it lightly? Coat it with mineral spirits? OK- I'll forget the linseed because it yellowish. I have walnut oil in my cupboard waiting to be used in a special medium.

There appears to be minimal varnish or none on the painting- it has a very non-shiny matte appearance.

Here is the painting- by someone who signed it "Kressley", translated – generic painting factory person..?

April nineteen, 2007 at 10:54 am #1084314

Dollardays,
I was not making reference to a unproblematic overpainting with thicker paint over existing cracks. As the oils dry out, and the canvas expands and contracts as all sheet do, the spiral cracks will exist repeated in the new layer. I was refering to a more elaborate repair job-although it would be experimental (I agree with Einion that for all applied purposes cracks are not repaired). What you lot are making reference to is simply a cheap and dingy overpainting which could easily exist done in a few hours. Have at information technology. Have fun. Maybe that is plenty to satisfy your friend.
You might consider using an alkyd resin mixed in with your paint, alkyd is extremely resistant to cracking and is more flexible than oil past itself. It might filibuster repeat not bad some number of years. I would too steel wool the surface of the sky before proceeding to rid yourself of dirt, grime, etc. to let for a ameliorate bond.

April 20, 2007 at 1:37 pm #1084310

OK, Einion, I need to re-word this. Is there a way to camouflage and or hibernate the cracks in the original oil so that it will wait good for another four-5 years?

Er, well if that'due south all you're looking for then maybe, but it would depend a bit on the 3-dimensional aspects of the cracks. Painting over with more pigment might just make for softer-looking furnishings, while it still appears there's something wron. What I'one thousand suggesting is that it might look like in baking where you put a thin layer of icing over a block surface that's rough – you can still come across that roughness under the canvass of icing.

Anyway, if y'all want to endeavor this – for this kind of limited lifespan – I would have the canvas off the stretchers and bond it to a rigid support (ply, MDF) every bit the first stride. That would be the only way to ensure there'due south no flexing due to humidity changes that will transmit the existing cracks through to the new paint when hardened.

(It Volition Non take me a hundred hours, kazucks- I predict information technology will take ii hours)

In conservation cracks are dealt with by inpainting, which is done meticulously and sometimes under a stereo microscope

Einion

Apr 20, 2007 at 2:18 pm #1084312

I like the thought of getting it onto a rigid back up.

You could also try sanding the afflicted areas and overpainting with oil paint using mineral sprit acrylic (MSA) varnish every bit a medium. It might give you more flexibility in the new paint layer. You'll be able to varnish the whole painting in no time after that. I'd suggest a matt or satin finish last varnish every bit it will help to hide the distortion of the surface that the cracks take caused.

Simon

April twenty, 2007 at seven:45 pm #1084318

I thought I would give you a await at what I've washed then far. Thank you to all for your responses, including the person who PM'd me with detailed instructions on how to do it right. I needed to become to it today equally I told her I would piece of work on it this calendar week and accept something for her to await at side by side week and I didn't want to go out and purchase all those things I would never utilise again.

Wow- it's Friday already is what I was thinkign as I pulled the tacks out of the canvass- what a cheap framing chore! It took me an hr and 20 minutes from start to finsih. Afterwards information technology is dry out to the impact I'll view it at all angles and encounter if the cracks are viewable. I used a pretty bright lite and I couldn't see any after i was done but information technology could sink in a scrap. If so- I will go over information technology again with fifty-fifty THICKER pigment.

Basically what I did was sand with steel wool (lightly) the sky area. I rubbed in some archival oils classic medium. solvent, oil, varnish- it is a slow drier. So I mixed some generic grays from pthalo bluish, yellowish ochre, and aliz crimson plus a chip of burnt umber. I did a darker blueish underpainting gradating from nighttime at the summit to lighter near the horizon. I used a castor to go effectually the buildings and trees and scumbled a bot of the color into the copse and buildings. So I loaded the knife with lots of white paint and troweled information technology on.
Repainted the tiny night lines that correspond something I practise non empathise on top of the buildings- maybe fences to keep people from jumping?

Information technology'southward non too bad- When dry to the impact I'll suit the color a bit with more than glazes and scumbling if necessary. Needs to exist slightly cooler in places I think.
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