Emulsions and Paintings

MY PAINTINGS MADE WITH
'CALCITE SUN OIL' and EMULSIONS
EL GRECO and the style of 'Triangularism"
THE TRANSPARENCY OF THE EMULSION
My teacher FREDERIC TAUBES

I learned to oil paint by studying books by Mr. Frederic Taubes ( 1900-1981), the noted American artist and
educator. Mr. Taubes believed the 15th century Flemish Old Masters, known for some of the best preserved
oil paintings, used Copal Resin, as an ingredient in their painting medium. In the 1940's Mr. Taubes'
experiments and studies, led him to formulate a line of paint mediums that became famous, and were sold
under his name, "Taubes". I learned to oil paint using his mediums. Subsequent developments in technology
resulted in wide use of Acrylic paints, and development of Synthetic resins, including synthetic Copals. After
Mr. Taubes' death, his paint mediums declined and disappeared from the market. During Taubes' life, there
were notable 'experts' who disagreed with Mr. Taubes' beliefs.They claimed use of hard natural resins, like
Copal or Amber, were in fact injurious to the long term preservation of oil paint. They claimed eventual
darkening and brittleness of the oil paint layers. After Mr. Taubes' death, the scientific analytic methods of
paint samples from Old Master paintings improved, providing information Mr. Taubes was unaware of. Since
the 1990's, advanced studies show the addition of calcium carbonate in the colors of some masters ( it was
known to be used in the white) and the addition of protein ingredients such as egg, in the paint structure.
Professor DR. Ernst Van De Wetering, a renowned Rembrandt scholar has stated the protein ingredient has
been found in the work of Rembrandt AND Jan Van Eyck.
My book will show how to easily make and apply two different Emulsions, each having important different
properties. The Emulsion has several uses. One purpose is to use the Emulsion as an 'Oil out' to insure
adhesion. Another purpose is to stop wrinkling in polymerized impasto paint. A very important purpose of the
Emulsion is to use it as the ideal paint thinner, to change the paint consistency and to allow the painting of
micro-fine lines and details.
My experiments with "Calcite Sun Oil" and "Emulsions" have resulted in a SAFE and PERMANENT method of
oil painting that has solved all the technical problems I encountered for many years using hazardous solvents,
resins, and driers. The benefits of using "Calcite Sun Oil" and Emulsions are many, and my book will provide
you with knowledge to help you master the oil painting medium with excellent results.

all paintings are copyright protected by
the artist. unlawful to reproduce without
hand signed written permission

'Butterflys' ( Mariposas) Oil on Birch plywood, 2006, 24" X 18", 2006, with details. The actual size of the butterflys is about two
inches. The micro-fine white lines were painted on top of a wet black paint. My book will show you how to do this. Each white line
or dot is raised, firm, clear, without any bleeding or distortion. And, they dry within 24 hours.

LA PALOMA TRISTE ( THE SAD DOVE) Oil on Birch plywood, 24" X 18", 2006, with detail. "Calcite Sun Oil" as the
Grinding Oil creates a viscous paint, and the Emulsion is used as the thinner and the 'oil out'. Together they allow the artist
to create abstracted forms or fine detailed realistic forms. Addition of dry calcite allows thick impasto when desired.

"SHORTY" Oil on Birch plywood, 30 X 24" , 2006, with detail. This painting evolved through five overpaint sessions. Each
time, a Viscous Emulsion was used as the 'oil out' to insure adhesion of the new paint layer. And, to allow firm clear thick
and thin paint that stayed exactly as I placed it. Blending was easily done when needed.

"La Paloma y La Tormenta" ( The Dove and the Storm)Oil on Birch plywood, 18" X 24", 2006. "Calcite Sun Oil"
and the Viscous Emulsion allow fluid easy painting and rendering fine details that will not bleed, lose their clarity. Any
corrective paint layers are easily completed as the Emulsion will insure adhesion.

EMULSIONS, the " WONDER MEDIUM "

The effects you see in my recent paintings using my formulations of "Calcite Sun Oil" ,and Emulsions
are easily accomplished. The ingredients are SAFE and have been proven to be PERMANENT as famous
masterpieces of history show. EGG is one of the oldest binders ever used for painting, and experts have
stated it is more durable than oil as a binder. The main limitation of the EGG TEMPERA PAINTING METHOD,
where egg is the binder, is that it dries so fast, and blending is made very difficult even in the hands of highly
skilled masters. One method of blending is by hatching and cross-hatching fine lines. Andrew Wyeth, a
famous American artist is a master of EGG tempera painting and the famous Van Eyck brothers from 15th
century northern Europe were trained as EGG tempera paintings.

It is the Van Eyck brothers who formulated a revolutionary new paint medium ( kept as a secret) that allowed
them to overcome all the deficiencies of the ancient oil paint medium. The oil in the ancient oil paint medium
had either one of two properties: viscosity or non-viscosity, and each had great advantages and disastrous
disadvantages. Read my book for a full explanation of these two conditions of the oil, and why they caused
artists so many problems.

TRIANGULARISM
A STYLE I DEVELOPED, BASED ON THE PAINTINGS OF ' EL GRECO'

El Greco , Domenico Theotokopolous, has always been one of my favorite painters. He lived in an era surrounded
by the art history of Greece, Rome, the classical Italian Renaissance art of Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael and
others and actually studied with Titian. He left Italy to live in Toledo Spain, where he died in 1614.

When I was 10 years old, I saw my first E Greco painting in a book. His paintings IMMEDIATELY and POWERFULLY
appealed to me because of his masterful control of the Oil Paint; his very personal vibrant, rich, deep color
combinations; his extraordinarily personal dynamic design composition structure; and his unique realism, using
aspects of surrealism... much of the masterful aspects of his work, were far ahead of his time, while his form of
'realism' was still accepted in his own time. Velazquez, born in Seville Spain in 1599, loved his work! Francisco
Pacheco, Velazquez' teacher, wrote about actually watching El Greco paint!

Over the years I was so captivated by and drawn to El Greco's elongated forms, and the other aspects of his work I
described that I sought out every original I could find. Ive traveled Spain, Europe and American museums...
JUST to see the El Grecos ( and also to see every one of Rembrandt's work I could find).

I the year 2006, I was painting the painting " SHORTY", shown here below. Shorty was my dog when I was a youth,
and the person in the painting is me ... an imaginative self-portrait of myself at about age 17. As a youth, I was a
farm worker, and I show myself under an olive tree, after a day of harvesting olives.

During the painting of " Shorty" I has CONSCIOUSLY not trying to paint Photographically, nor with Naturalism. For
the past twenty years, my youthful realist style had been undergoing changes with influences of Modernism.
Modernism, since CUBISM, uses geometric, man-made shapes. Circles, Rectangles, Triangles, Cubes, etc. all very
consciously. CUBISM was a way to change REALISM, yet keep REALISM. It was a way to paint a MODERN form of
realism. In this painting, I was using the palette knife frequently with application of thick paint, and avoided subtle
changes of values, and ignored natural color as seen in nature. As the painting evolved over several difficult over
painting sessions, I saw that I was combining REALISTIC shapes with TRIANGLES.

Then one evening, as I often do, I picked up a book on a famous artist. On this date I picked up the EL GRECO
book. As I leafed through the book, loving every very familiar painting, I saw for the very first time in my life...
that EL GRECO... used lots of TRIANGLES in his work. There are TRIANGLES everywhere! There are Triangles
within Triangles. There are TRIANGLES forming NEGATIVE spaces as well as forming POSITIVE spaces. Some
triangles are short and fat, others extremely elongated. Some disappear , yet they can still be detected!

The painting of "La Paloma Triste" uses this new 'Triangularism" approach in a more modernist way, yet combining
the abstractions with the ' reality' of natural forms. Mountains are based on the triangles, and the negative spaces
as well, as can be seen in the space between the two tails of the doves, and the tails themselves.

This realization changed my viewing of El Greco's paintings. It helped me understand how he composed and
designed and structured his work, and gave it its DYNAMIC sensation! Using this knowledge, I consciously explored
the use of TRIANGLES in these recent paintings of mine. I have explained this aesthetic approach to other painters
and have now seen its impact on their work. I am excited that it will develop by others into a very recognizable style.
If you found this of interest, please write to me with your own experiences.

THE " CALCITE SUN OIL / EMULSIONS" METHOD
"Achieve the Old Masters' paint quality with SAFETY and PERMANENCE"

MY TEACHER:FREDERIC TAUBES (1900-1981)

Frederic Taubes was born in Poland and emigrated to the USA in about 1930. He is an important American
Artist and Art Educator. His paintings are in many US Museums and he authored over 20 books on the
methods and materials of art. He had great respect for the craftsmanship and the art of the great masters of
oil painting.I consider Mr. Taubes to be my teacher, who instilled in me the love for the methods and materials
of oil painting while emphasizing the importance of originality, creativity, and individual expression.

Like many realists of the early and mid 20th century, his fame and reputation diminished with the onset of
abstract expressionism of the 60's and latter part of the century. All indications are that his importance is
gaining a resurgence of attention. His grandson, Timothy Taubes, has recently created an important website
to celebrate and share Frederic Taubes important legacy to American Art. I invite all readers to take the time
to study this website:www.frederictaubes.com

A monograph was published in 1946 by the American Artists Group of New York. The set of over 20 important
artists of the era included such recognized masters as John Stewart Curry, John Sloan, Stuart Davis, Edward
Hopper, Kuniyoshi and others. Mr. Taubes' inclusion with such important artists reflects the high regard he
was given in his life.

I believe his paintings reflect the uniqueness of his personal aesthetic vision, the craftsmanship and love of
the great masters and his place in modern art and life. His artworks are characterized by beauty of design,
sumptuous paint quality and an imaginative sometimes surreal expression of visual reality.

Mr. Taubes was the formulator of the once famous TAUBES painting mediums based on his studies and
beliefs that the Old Masters used hard COPAL RESIN. His products were manufactured and produced for the
market and were quite famous for many years. After his death, his formulated mediums were replaced by less
expensive synthetic materials. Coincidentally, it was the loss of his Copal painting materials that caused my
life long search for the best painting materials and mediums. The final result was ' Calcite Sun Oil" and the
two egg glair- unrefined linseed oil emulsions described in my book.

The Taubes COPAL products HAD all the hazardous ingredients that I now no longer will use. His
formulations used Turpentine, Petroleum Distillates, Resins, and Driers. As a 13 year old youth in 1956, I
learned to oil paint with his mediums. BUT... I was unaware of two important things.

ONE: The detrimental effect of hazardous art materials on the human body.

TWO: A method to oil paint with SAFETY and PERMANENCE without the hazardous materials. PAINTING IN
OILS, without the hazardous materials was important knowledge and was not available to me nor to any other
person, in any of the instructional art books of the era ( 1950's) AND NOT EVEN to artists of the present.
UNTIL I published my book in 2004. My book provides the knowledge on how one can paint in oils Safely and
with Permanence, without use of any of the hazardous materials I mentioned. TODAY my book allows
professional and amateur oil painters a choice on whether to paint with or without hazardous materials.

Even though Frederic TAUBES' method used HAZARDOUS MATERIALS, I respect all the dedication and
effort and knowledge expressed by Mr. Taubes, and I will always have the highest regard for him as an artist,
educator and person. I was lucky to have met him in person when I was 15 years old. I wish I could visit with
him today ... we would have so much to talk about.

Please visit the TAUBES website and write Mr. Timothy Taubes a note.

www.frederictaubes.com

TWO REMARKABLE EMULSIONS

I HAVE DEVELOPED TWO EMULSIONS ( THE ' VISCOUS EMULSION" AND THE ' NON-VISCOUS
EMULSION") THAT ALLOW AN OIL PAINTER TO ACCOMPLISH IMPORTANT VISUAL EFFECTS AND
FACILITATE THE HANDLING OF THE OIL PAINT. THESE TWO EMULSIONS ARE SIMILAR, BUT STILL
DIFFERENT. THEY ACCOMPLISH THE SAME NEEDS, BUT DRY AT DIFFERENT RATES. THESE
EMULSIONS ARE SAFE AND PERMANENT, AND ARE MADE OF TWO ANCIENT BINDERS OF PIGMENTS
THAT HAVE BEEN USED FOR CENTURIES. MY BOOK EXPLAINS THEIR PURPOSES, THE APPLICATION
METHODS ( WHICH ARE IMPORTANT TO KNOW), AND THEIR IMPORTANCE.

THIS PAGE INCLUDES NEVER BEFORE SEEN PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE 'VISCOUS EMULSION" THAT
DEMONSTRATES ITS NON-YELLOWING QUALITY. THE EMULSION IS MIXED IN A JAR, AND IS EASILY
MADE WITHIN 10 TO 15 SECONDS IF THE TWO VERY SPECIFIC AND IMPORTANT INGREDIENTS ARE AT
HAND. THE EMULSION MUST BE REFRIGERATED WHEN NOT IN USE, AS THE EGG PORTION WILL SPOIL
IF NOT REFRIGERATED.

WHAT IS AN EMULSION?

An Emulsion is a perfect blend of an oily substance and a watery substance. On a microscopic level, one
will enter the other, so, it can be either a 'watery' or an ' oily' Emulsion, depending on which enters which.

An Emulsion is superior to mixtures of resins and oil, as these two ingredients will only CO-MINGLE and dry
at different rates, whereas an EMULSION is a perfect mixture.

The jar has a rectangle drawn with black ink.
This area in the rectangle was wiped down thinly
as one would use it in applying the oil out, when oil painting.

It is completely clear and transparent and it is completely
emulsified and it has no yellowish color at all.
Please note that the emulsion that was NOT wiped thinly is
encrusted on the side of the glass jar and any discoloration
is due to the thickness of the concentration.

The emulsion that is stuck to the side of the jar demonstrates
its adhesiveness. I shook the jar very hard and could not
dislodge the emulsion that is on the jar.

These photos, shown for the first time anywhere, show
the beauty and wonder of the TRANSPARENCY of the
Emulsions. This photo is copyright protected
copyright 2008, Louis R. Velasquez
Please note this photo cannot be used without my permission.

JACQUE MAROGER'S EMULSION FORMULA
In 1931, Jacques Maroger ( French 1884 - 1962) published his claim of having re-discovered
the ' lost secret medium of the Van Eycks". France bestowed great honors on Maroger for his
'discovery'.

Maroger later moved to the USA, and continued to make Formulations and eventually published
his book, which in 1948 was translated into English. His subsequent Formulations, listed as '
painting mediums' of the Old Masters are referred to as " Meguilp" , or ' Maroger's Medium" and
have a stormy reputation. However, his 1931 Formulation, which he called an EMULSION, is
wholly different from his latter MEGUILP formulations.

My book includes an in depth analysis of Marogers 1931 EMULSION formulation.
I believe my essay clearly explains WHY Maroger's EMULSION formula failed.
I believe I can prove WHY Maroger did NOT rediscover the " lost secret medium of the Van
Eycks".

OIL PAINTING with 'CALCITE SUN OIL'
SAFETY and PERMANENCE without Hazardous Solvents,
Resins, Varnishes and Driers'
by Louis R. Velasquez

Available from this website or WORLDWIDE from all Online
Bookstores. See its full description at AMAZON.
READ the REVIEWS.

This new book teaches a Revolutionary Method of Oil
Painting based on Rembrandt and Velazquez. Three
ANCIENT archival and SAFE artist's materials allow the
complete elimination of hazards Solvents and other commonly
used materials in Oil Painting.

'CALCITE SUN OIL'/EMULSIONS is on YOUTUBE
JUST COPY and PASTE THIS URL TO YOUR BROWSER

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljy1rULu7sg

I own several original Taubes Paintings.
In time, I will place them all here on my site.
Some are in better condition than others.

The first one to your right is a portrait of his
wife LILY. It is an outstanding TAUBES
painting. Taubes normally did not date his
paintings. But, going by the style, this
painting can be guessed to be from the early
1940's. This large painting is about 40" X 30"

BELOW in the photo, is my wall of honor
dedicated to Mr. Taubes.
A large beautiful unsigned painting, several
etchings in a variety of styles, and the cover
of American Artist magazine from Jan. 1943.