The Versatile Master Artist

Chapter 97 - 83: The Old Church Under the Lady Painter’s Brush

Inside the black art tube, there are a total of three paintings.

As soon as Gu Weijing touched the inside of the tube with his hand, he frowned immediately.

There’s a problem with the preservation method of these paintings—they are rolled inward, and there’s no filling in the middle of the tube.

"A very elementary mistake."

A thought immediately crossed Gu Weijing’s mind.

Oil painting is a three-dimensional art, the paint isn’t merely a simple two-dimensional plane.

It has volume and thickness.

If you’ve touched the paper of a painting yourself, you’ll intuitively feel the surface is uneven like a coarse particle board.

These are marks left by the painter while applying paint with a brush on the canvas.

The paint solidifies layer by layer on the canvas surface, forming the unique gloss and texture of oil paintings.

This paint is relatively fragile.

So after the painting is completed, proper preservation is very important.

Generally, to prevent the paint on the surface of the oil painting from weathering and cracking, a layer of varnish is usually sprayed on the canvas surface, and then fixed with a frame in a light-proof place.

If you really dislike the space a frame occupies, it’s not impossible to roll it up and store it in a tube.

But to preserve it better and prevent the paint from being compressed, even if you use a tube, the basic principle is: the direction of the roll should be with the painted side facing outward, not inward like the tube in Gu Weijing’s hand.

Normally, it’s also necessary to put a thicker paper tube in the center of the art tube to prevent the painting from being accidentally crushed.

This is basic knowledge for preserving oil paintings; it’s not complicated and doesn’t require technical skill.

As long as you pay attention, you won’t make mistakes.

Such hasty handling of these three paintings implies two possibilities.

Either the person handling these works was an amateur, or they believed these three paintings weren’t worth much attention, treating them as ordinary trash.

Or a combination of both.

Gu Weijing felt chilled; he knew a masterpiece wouldn’t be treated this way.

However, he calmed himself and unfolded the dirty canvases one by one before himself.

These oil paintings appear to have been decorations in rooms at the Great Scholar Hotel.

The first one on top seemed brighter, but after just a glance, Gu Weijing lost interest.

No wonder those handling the paintings were casual.

It’s really not a good work.

In fact, it’s not an oil painting at all; it’s a printed replica.

Modern oil paint is dense and paste-like, while a print is a layer of colored dots attached to the surface of cotton fabric or plastic paste.

Just take a casual look against the light, and it’s easy to discern the real from the fake.

It’s expected. Looking at the tag on the display stand, Gu Weijing originally shouldn’t have expected much.

Most of the art displays in hotels worldwide consist of such pieces.

Prints are far cheaper than hand-painted oil paintings, and over seventy percent of tourists lack the ability to distinguish between them.

"Twentieth-century exquisite old painting... really, such exaggerated claims."

Gu Weijing commented sarcastically.

The second painting was the same unremarkable work, followed by the third, again just as dirty, still the same...

Wait!

Initially drowned in disappointment, Gu Weijing sensed something was off the moment he got hold of the canvas.

His gaze hadn’t landed on the canvas yet, but his sense of touch had already fed back information to his mind.

The feel of this canvas was distinctly different from the previous two.

The first two were paintings, or rather, prints on cotton fabric.

The advantage of using cotton fabric as a base for oil paintings is it’s cheap.

The downside is everything apart from being cheap.

Cotton fabric is overly smooth, lacks elasticity, and is prone to erosion by acidic paints.

But this canvas feels soft and elastic to the touch.

There’s a unique texture style on its surface; one can feel the interwoven plant fibers.

This is a pure linen canvas.

This is rare and valuable, especially for old paintings.

Even in today’s advanced textile industry, a roll of natural flax canvas dubbed "Empress of fibers" can cost several hundred US Dollars.

Many art students can’t afford high-quality pure linen canvas and settle for cotton or blended half-linen instead.

The price of a pure linen canvas is several times that of cotton fabric, making it a significant expenditure for a painter, especially in early periods.

Gu Weijing’s spirit was invigorated.

He bowed his head and carefully scrutinized the canvas.

And upon this examination,

he was stunned once again.

Gu Weijing never expected to see such an extraordinary work.

This is a dark-toned oil painting.

Since its inception, Impressionism took the stage against Classical and Romantic styles.

It opposed any religious mythical subjects and grayish-brown hues in artworks.

This painting, however, adopts Impressionistic techniques yet contrasts the traditional approach.

The painter depicts an old church in a thunderstorm.

The artwork extensively uses dark color spots, and coupled with poor preservation, appears very dirty.

Significant traces of paint weathering and cracking have disrupted the original harmony of the painting.

It looks as if it had been dredged up from the earth.

The first impression upon holding this painting was a strong sense of dissonance.

It’s entirely unlike any Impressionist works he encountered before.