From: Judy Seigel (jseigel@panix.com)
Date: 04/20/02-10:02:30 PM Z
On Sat, 20 Apr 2002, William Marsh wrote:
> I'm still not sure if I'm ready to believe this, but have any of you
> ever had watercolor paper be too old or "go bad," say after 15 years or
> so? Arches HP 90lb. stored in its original package? Can the sizing age
> to a point at which the paper is altered?
I've never had it happen, but my friend David Aldera, paper buyer at NY
Central, says it can/ does -- the idea being that the gelatin dries up. I
suspect also it could be the nature of the paper -- I'm reminded today by
a friend about story from -- I think that was David, too. A customer was
having much trouble with a batch of Arches, tested it & found it full of
acid. Reported to Arches, who said "the paper is acid free." Of course my
*arch* friend pointed out that that only meant they didn't charge for the
acid (well, I've been indexing all day, am entitled to be arch myself).
Anyway, acid over a period of 15 years might well affect the size.
Generally speaking though, I've found that a bad size coat on paper (when
students have boiled, cooked, scalded, whatever) is fixed by a fresh coat
of gelatin size. In the case mentioned, however, the artist had done a
great deal of handwork in making a book... total loss.
David said, BTW, that it could happen in a couple of years if you've
gelatin sized but not used the paper. However, I often keep sized paper
that long & haven't noticed that particular problem (yet).
Judy
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