#enamelpainter

[Detail of] William Birch’s Paint Box, ca. 1780. Courtesy of the Philadelphia History Museum at the Atwater Kent, The Historical Society of Pennsylvania Collection.

Enamel painting is a painstaking technique in which a glass-like flux is mixed with mineral colors and fused to a piece of metal under extreme heat.  It was hard to control the process, and the same color compound could “come from the fire very different in their seperate [sic]  preparations, from the delicacy of chymical practice.”  

William Birch’s paint box, which was handed down through six generations of his descendants, contained color charts (one dated 1782), bottles of powdered colors, a mortar and pestle to grind them with, dozens of blanks in various sizes, mostly copper but also brass and iron, more blanks already glazed and ready for painting, and a single paint brush.

The first step in making a reduced image of a painting or a print was graphing it onto paper.  This sketch of Ary Scheffer’s (1795-1858) small oil portrait of Lafayette was used to make an enamel.  The lines helped Birch keep every part of the picture in proportion.  He probably used the same technique to reduce or enlarge his own enamels, which he offered in a range of sizes.

William Birch after Ary Scheffer, Preparatory sketch for Marquis de Lafayette portrait, 1824.  Pencil sketch. Library Company of Philadelphia.

William Birch after Ary Scheffer, Marquis de Lafayette, 1824. Enamel on copper. Courtesy of the Yale University Art Gallery.

In his first exhibition at the London Society of Artists in 1775, Birch styled himself “Enamel Painter,” and he continued to do so for the rest of his career.    Miniature painting was a valued specialization in Birch’s time, and enamel miniatures were especially prized because their colors were clear, brilliant, and permanent.  They were often incorporated into jeweled settings or snuff boxes, which could sell for the equivalent of thousands of dollars in today’s money.  

William Birch, Triumph of America, 1826.  Enamel on copper. Courtesy of Philadelphia Museum of Art. Purchased with the Joseph E. Temple Fund, 1912.

This small enamel was copied from the right hand part of the engraving, Peace of Ghent 1814 and the Triumph of America shown in the exhibition, and was set as a pin.