IOO 
FLERAMIC STUDIO 
at some previous time be added to, as the evaporation 
will cause excessive oiliness. While paste may be ground 
too much to produce good results, poor work is more liable 
to come from lack of grinding. Too little oil or a poor 
paste will also make work grainy. 
When paste is cracked while it still adheres to the 
china, the disaster may be remedied to some extent, if 
not made perfect, by working fresh paste into the crack 
until no more can be forced in. It may then be dried, 
gilded and fired. 
Paste should never be dried by artificial heat unti 
the surface looks dull, when the warmth will not injure 
it; and it must be thoroughly dry before the gold is applied. 
While this may be safely done before firing, by an ex- 
perienced worker, it is unwise for the beginner, who should 
first have the piece fired. 
Paste may be placed over either heavy or light coats 
of unfired mat colors provided they are well dried, and 
also over light tints of dry over glaze colors. But when 
placed over heavy overglaze colors without removing the 
color underneath, the paste will be almost sure to blister. 
Unfiuxed gold, which contains but little flux, some- 
times none, is best for use on raised paste. However, 
the home prepared fluxed gold serves the purpose admir- 
ably. 
Paste is frequently used to set jewels on china. Put 
a dot of paste where the jewel is to be needed, then press 
it firmly down upon the paste allowing the paste to set up 
around it. This may be gilded when dry. 
Raised paste may be painted over with powder colors 
prepared in the usual way and produce a slightly similar 
effect but are not as highly glazed as enamels. As the 
paste absorbs much color the fired colors are much darker 
than if the same color were placed on the white ware. 
Where paste is used with lustre it is well to fire the 
lustre first and retouch before putting on the paste, as 
the least trace of lustre on paste will prevent the gold 
firing a good color. It is well to avoid a very hard kind 
of china for use with paste. 
A rather uncommon but effective way of using the 
powder paste is to paint on the china a design suitable 
for a border, one of leaves and stems is good, with fat oil, 
to which has been added a little dry water color paint, 
just enough to enable one to see where the oil has been 
placed; and then, with a shader heavily charged with 
Marsching's powder paste, cover the oil until it will absorb 
no more. After being hard dried and covered with two 
coats of gold and fired, divisions or overlapping leaves 
may be indicated by touches of blood red paint ; retire and 
burnish. 
Beginners usually find the management of paste 
work difficult, but practice and patience will in time en- 
able one to do creditable work, neatly executed. 
o o o 
Second Prize — Sydney Scott Lewis, Georgetown, Ky. 
Paste skillfully applied and appropriately used is a 
joy. Abuse the use of it and it is an abomination. 
Of all the branches of china painting it is one of the 
most difficult to do well, and has many terrors for the 
amateur and often one with a good deal of experience 
meets with disaster. 
Hancock's paste is the best make. Put the powder 
on a ground glass slab, put in just enough fat oil to hold 
it together, not enough to make a paste of it, but to darken 
and make it crumbly. Breathe on it (not blow) and mix 
with palette knife (horn or steel). The breath gives 
moisture, and takes the place of too much oil, cuts the oil 
and makes the paste work better. After the fat oil is 
worked in add enough lavender oil (dilute lavender oil 
with a little alcohol, to keep it from being too oily) to thin 
it, rub this into the powder with a ground glass muller, 
then after it has been well ground turn over and over with 
the palette knife, breath and mix, any number of times, 
adding more lavender oil as it dries out. When it is a 
thick, smooth, creamy paste and does not flatten out, 
stays put, and follows the brush in a smooth even line, 
it is in a condition for modeling and making dots ; for lines 
it needs to be a little less stiff and for flat spaces, thin with 
lavender oil until it flows readily from the brush and covers 
the space desired. 
To make a dot or fine line, take a little on the tip of 
the brush, do not fill the brush with the paste, insert the 
tip of the brush under the paste and pull it out with a 
quick upward movement, so as to keep the lump of paste 
on the upper side of the brush. To make dots hold the 
brush at right angles to the surface and touch lightly 
with the brush. If there is a point to the dot moisten 
the end of the brush or finger and touch it and it will flat- 
ten down. For a fine line fill the brush the same way and 
draw it along the outline. If you wish the line wider in 
some places put more pressure on the brush where you wish 
to widen it. 
Modeling in paste means to raise some parts and 
leave others low, giving the look of the real flower. When 
you want some parts more modeled than others put on 
some of the paste, then, when that is partly dry, put on 
more paste. 
Paste for flat spaces should be soft enough to smooth 
itself and not show the brush marks. To use a pen with 
paste, mix the powder with ^ sugar and dilute with water, 
rub until smooth. This is good for fine lines and mono- 
grams. A fine well executed paste line should look like 
a gold wire encircling the design. All irregular paste lines 
can be retouched before firing by smoothing with a tracer 
wet with a very little turpentine. 
For paste lines and dots use sable outlines No. oo and 
No. i and flat pointed sables for modeling. Paste, provided 
it is kept very clean, can be kept indefinitely. Indeed 
some claim that the longer the better. 
Paste should not be put over heavy color, may be put 
over a light unfired color. Gold may be put over perfectly 
dry unfired paste, silver should not. Paste should not 
be dried artificially, should not be raised too high.. The 
dots should not have little holes, bubbles, or points, but 
should be smooth, round and flat on top. When paste is 
cracked though still staying on the china it had too much 
oil; take some fresh paste that has very little oil, moisten 
by breathing and fill up the cracks, press in as tightly as 
possible, put on the gold and fire 
If the paste work, however, has many defects gold 
will not hide them. If paste rubs off from an under fire 
a hard fire will remedy it. Paste will chip off over heavy 
color, when put in too fat, when artificially dried, or too 
much oil. Fill up the chips with aufsetzweis and after 
firing put in gold and fire again. It will burnish a little 
brighter than over the paste. If the paste rubs off like 
powder it is under-fired. It should always look dull be- 
fore firing. If when working with paste it does not hold 
together put in a little more oil. 
Paste can be grounded on just like powdered color 
and treated so as to look very much like etched china. 
Use the grounding oil and ground on the powder paste 
