Rosemaling: December 2007 Archives

   The emergence of Rosemaling has a lot to do, I believe, with pride of farm ownership. The rest of Europe was still under a feudal system where the land belonged to the King, Lords, and the Church. Norwegian farms were owned by the farmers themselves. In 1660 forty percent of the farms were farmer owned. In 1723 - 1730 even more land became farmer owned when the church owned lands were sold at auction.  If a farm stayed in the family for a sufficient length of time, special laws enacted during the Viking age came into effect. One of these laws allowed family members to redeem a family farm that has been sold.  These laws served to protect land ownership within the family. Consequently a farmer knew that improvements he made to the farm would benefit his descendants.  Perhaps he would even be remembered by his descendants for the improvements he had made.  Many farm owners made sure their names were remembered by having them rosemaled on the walls, ceilings, or built-in furniture of their farmhouse!

Brushes

I suggest my beginning student buy three brushes.  And, I use just these three brushes for painting almost everything!
Loew-Cornell Golden Taklon
Size 4 Round 7000 series
Size 6 Flat 7300 series for scrolls
Size 1 Script liner 7050 series for outlining

For painting interiors I use:

A one inch wide Flat glaze brush for scrolls
Size 16 Flat for flowers
Size 8 Round 7000 series for outlining

Paint

I suggest that my beginning students use Delta Ceramcoat. In order to keep costs down, our projects only use five colors. I like the Delta colors listed below because they closely resemble the traditional rosemaling colors.
Red Iron Oxide
Antique Gold
Prussian Blue
Antique White
Burnt Umber

I paint with Jo Sonja’s Artists’ Acrylic Colours.  (I don’t recommend these for beginners because I find I need to mix in retarder, kleister, or flow medium to produce the correct painting consistency.)
The Jo Sonja colors I use the most often are:
Red Earth
Yellow Oxide
Prussian Blue
Warm White
Burnt Umber

Rosemaling is a style of decorative painting that was originally practiced in Norway from 1700 to 1880.  It was used to decorate walls, ceilings, and furniture, as well as decorate everyday useful wood objects such as trunks, bowls, tankards, and lidded containers. The traditional media was oil paints and occasionally chalk.  

Characteristics of Rosemaling

• Decorates practical objects
• Organic feel
• Scrolls dominate the design
• Flowers are stylized
• Scrolls and flowers are ornamentally outlined
• Curved lines, not straight or geometric
• Not realistic
• Two-dimensional
• Traditional colors are toned pigments

The first piece I ever rosemaled was a barrel stave in a beginner class.  We based in the pattern in the colors our teacher told us.  Then we floated highlights and shading just how our teacher instructed. Finally we added outlining strokes where they were marked out on the pattern.  And we all went home with identical pieces. I was thrilled to be rosemaling.  But, there wasn’t any creativity in it.

I then purchased quite a few rosemaling pattern books. I proceeded over the next few years to trace the patterns, follow the directions, and replicate as closely as I could the photographs in the books.

But, my breakthrough was when I read a quote by Sigmund Arseth. He stated that a student should not copy patterns for more than two or three lessons. “This can become a fatal habit that will prevent the student from ever advancing to the creative level in rosemaling.” (Uh oh!) I took his advice to heart.  Now, I rosemal freehand.  And I have to say, I find freehand painting much more enjoyable and creative!  (I’ll have a lot more to say about making the jump to freehand rosemaling in future posts.)