Sterling Scholar: My Framing

Sterling Scholar
~Regan Reichert
My Framing
I now am starting a small business out of my frame making skills I developed. I learned a
lot from the frame artist, Rett Ashby. His style, in
my opinion, is the most beautiful and fitting for my
style of painting. I have received instruction from
him and have received opinions of many
professional artists, some of which I now make
frames for. It started when I needed to frame my
artwork, but realized that the price of high quality
frames was too expensive. Knowing I had access to
my
fathers
wood working shop, I looked into how to
make high quality frames. I invested 500
dollars at first to get some basic supplies.
Seeing, after some experience, that there was
some potential in this I have since invested
much more. I
can now
frame my own
work with custom frames I design and build for much
cheaper. I also sell my frames to a couple professionals in
order to cover the art expenses I have. For Casey Childs, I
trade him frames for private teaching. I would never be
able to afford such education without this. Learning about
framing was quite a challenge. At first I had to research it
all on my own. I learned what I could about the traditional water gilding technique and
have practiced a lot. I then bought some genuine gold leaf, which really made the
difference in stepping up my quality of frames. I hope to keep this small business going
to carry me through the beginning of my career as an oil painter. I also hope to always
custom build my own
frames for my own
paintings.
(Artwork of Casey Childs)
Here I am working on the woodwork of a frame. This frame is one that

I designed myself for some specific paintings in
mind. After creating a simple wood frame I cut the
molding off the top and bottom to provide a flat
surface to attach further molding. On the back I
attach supports to unsure that the frame doesnt separate at the corners when
the seasons and humidity changes.
Some parts for this design are very delicate to
create. To go faster and to get exact measurements and symmetry, I
used a laser cutter. This required me to create the custom pieces in a
computer program and then send it to the laser cutter to have them
cut out of wood.
Once all of the woodworking
aspects of the frame are finished, I
start creating the finish I wish to have on the frame. Using the
traditional frame making methods at this point, I first seal the
wood with rabbit skin glue. Using a chalk and rabbit skin
mixture I make a gilding gesso. This gets applied in a couple
layers to fill in the pores of the wood and provide a smooth
surface to gild on. I use a fine steel wool to remove scratches
and to polish the gesso surface.
I mix up a bole mixture (in a homemade double boiler) made of a
natural red clay and rabbit skin glue. This red clay will act as the
adhesive for the gold leaf as well as to provide a warm under-finish
that I will rub out to show through in the final product. Once a
couple layers of this have been applied, I polish it. Wherever the
gold leaf is to be applied it has to be perfectly polished or it will
affect the look of the gold leaf.
To apply the gold leaf I mix water with a
little bit of alcohol and a hint of rabbit skin glue. I spread this on the area
right before I apply the sheets of gold leaf. This mixture reactivates the
clay it was laid on so when the leaf is applied it sticks to clay. This is an
extremely delicate process; the gold leaf comes in small sheets only a
couple microns thick. This requires very gentle movements and special
tools to work with it. It took a lot of gold leaf and YouTube videos for
me to finally get somewhat decent at it. For this frame I am using
genuine 24 K gold.
To create intricate gold corner designs, I lay down sheets of
the gold in the corners. I then come back the next day when
the gold has had plenty of time to cure and I paint over the
gold but leave it showing through in the design I wish to
have. To help me with
this part I used the laser
cutter again to make a
stencil. This way all my
corner designs will look
the same. Then, after a
couple layers of paint of various tints, I apply an antiquing layer. This is a milk paint that has
been thinned out to be very transparent. Once that dries I then take the fine steel wool and rub
down the frame. This will give it a worn, olden look and reveal the different layers I have applied.
This also will naturally leave more of the antiquing in the corners. I lightly rub the gold leaf to
where I can just see where the layers of gold where laid down. The small overlaps that show of
the sheets is a feature unique to genuine gold leaf that just adds that much more to the piece.
My Artwork

These are a sample of some of my work. These are some of my earlier pieces that I
did as far back as 2 years ago.
This prismacolor drawing won me my first ribbon at what
was my first art show.

This was another prismacolor that I
did of another basset hound.

This lower one is yet another prismacolor of a neighbors
basset hound. I was fascinated at both basset hounds and
prismacolor. The visual texture that could be created by the
multiple layers intrigued me. It was so fun to create the visual
effect of short fur as basset hounds have.

I then started my journey to become a painter.

These are some head studies that I did as I got
used to the feel of oil paint and how to use it to
turn the form of the head. These are done in a
very direct approach, with thick brush strokes.

I also worked on learning the color
anatomy of the head; learning the
color planes that are generally
present in certain areas and
identifying the greens and blues in
flesh tones.
The civil war paintings are from a
photo shoot I did. I borrowed the civil war uniforms from Gunny, they
WWII veteran that I restored a cannon for.

I have also done many drawings, something I like to do when I dont
have time to get started with oil paint. I have also done some
commissioned portrait drawings.
These are some of those
done tone on tone.

Here are some other paintings of mine done in various styles from pallet knife
(landscape) to mimicking flesh tones in a Carl Bloch style (baby).

These are my more recent works that show my development in the discipline of
portrait and figure painting. All of these paintings are done in oil paint. The drawing
is a vine charcoal master copy drawing of one of Nicolai Fechins pieces.

This piece I recently
finished in a classical
style. On most of these
pieces shown here, I have
made the frames,
including this one.

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Sterling Scholar

Here I am working on the woodwork of a frame. This frame is one that

I then started my journey to become a painter.

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