November 2019 - Line Vautrin etc

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In the studio most of the time. Sometimes delivering jewellery to nearby galleries - to have a chance to enjoy the changing weather, take photos, sketch out ideas for paintings and meet and catch up with gallery owners. Back home again and looking for and adding new galleries.

I'm a very early riser - always - since early childhood - I wake at 3am in winter - at 4am in the spring but that's only due to British Summer Time. Im perfectly happy with my Circadian Rhythm. During those early hours I can sense the peace and solitude of the night, walk out under the stars and the changing moon and feel part of the majesty of our little part of the universe and return home to the birds singing as they rise with the sun. But then I will make a cup of tea and return to the cosy haven of my bed where I can work on my laptop. 

Fizz is usually curled up as close to me as possible wherever I happen to be - purring deeply and a bit too loudly. It's my time to be undisturbed and to concentrate on writing, social media and researching. 

My current area of study is Line Vautrin ( my Pinterest board on her) - whose work I love, especially because I like to work in a similar area myself when I am not making my main range of jewellery. I like to experiment with what is to hand. Collecting thrown away fragments and natural forms, making moulds, casting resin, melting, burning and mixing stuff, mixing resin with other materials - currently Polyfilla Advanced.

This is Line Vautrine - gathered together for my own reference and shared here on my blog. Gathered from various sources.

Atypical jewellery and object designer, Line Vautrin had a remarkable career even if the name remains little known to the general public. She began with the creation of costume jewellery. 

She had a stand where she showed her creations in 1937 and opened a shop rue de Berry. She used a lot of materials - bronze, brass, terra-cotta, plastic. She develop a material that she called 'Talosel' - an acronym she derived from the French term for the material: aceTAte de celluLOSe ELaboré. 

Talosel - available in different colours - when placed in the water gave random results, so the 'Pellimorphoses' range was born.

Word games, Rebus sign boxes - using gold plating and Talosel - and mirrors - with a particular iridescent technique of her particular universe. 
Line Vautrin once had 50 people working in her studio, she also created an Art School to share her techniques. 


Also one of my dreams - a place to experiment and to share ideas.

Henry Perrichon often contrasted a hammered surface with faceted crystals. Inventor of Neo-medieval and Neo-Antique jewellery.

Talosel is a material invented around 1960 consisting of superimposed layers of resins worked with fire with inclusions of materials such as crystals.

Signed by Henry Perrichon on the back.

Size: 5 cm x 2.5 cm.

A lot of Talosel jewellery appears to be made from melting and burning (pyrography) sheets of cellulose acetate, as well as melting cabochons and other inclusions into the plastic. Some examples from auctions are shown.



Brooch with turquoise cabochon rhinestones and faceted red crystals.

Made in France in the early 1950's this type of jewellery is hand made and unique - it is 'One of a Kind'. 

Henry Perichon and Line Vautrin both experimented with with a new kind of resinous material called Cellulose Acetate, that she named 'Talosel' - (the acronym she derived from the French term for the material: aceTAte de celluLOSe ELaboré.) They worked with Talosel the way other worked with metal, melting it down and forming it into unusual shapes and ornaments, yielding a result that was strangely primitive, like medieval objects in a church treasury, and yet totally unique and unusual. 

	signed by Henry Perrichon

signed by Henry Perrichon

The mood of the time of the post-war period rejected the geometric shapes of art deco and welcomed the neo-medieval to baroque, the luxury inspired of yore - often seen at the cinema, during the occupation and in the immediate post-war and found in the poetic films in the costumes of Carné and Prévert or Jean Cocteau. The haute-couture then proposed dresses and hats of princesses ready to wander in the corridors of castles or to pose nonchalantly in salons.

The jewellery range named 'Henry' was in this reverie of the time but drawing from other times. They were sold in the stores of couture and luxury boutiques, the stars of the time as Michèle Morgan or Claudette Colbert wore them.

Today Henry is part of the creators of the great period of the fancy jewellery of luxury whose production is sought by collectors both in France and in Europe and the United States.

Talosel - was invented by the industries of Rhône-Poulenc at the beginning of the twentieth century - this plastic is the basis of Cellulose Acetate, harder and thicker that the Cellophane.

In his workshop 'Lyonnais' - Henri Périchon and Vautrin analysed the possibilities offered by this material - very similar to shell and associated to the technique of pyrography and created a new range of jewellery that was entirely artisanal. Shaped by hand, the mount was in basic Rhodoïd for this jewellery -  it was then crimped with metallic inclusions and rhinestones - originally, rhinestones were rock crystals gathered from the river Rhine, hence the name. The pieces of jewellery etc were made attractively unique by their specific stains.

May and June 2019 - Moving on Again

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May brought amongst all the many delights of Spring, the not so nice and very unexpected - the dreaded 'Notice to Quit'. It's very hard to keep your mind on much else when you know you have to find somewhere else to live in just 8 weeks. I've moved house so often though, that shock is soon replaced with a sense of increasing excitement. And I've learned to trust in the whole process. I had not at this stage accounted for the exhaustion that all of this would involve or the incredibly fiddly process of packing up my studio. I did fully realise that moving house and studio would involve getting behind with my work.

So I set off very early in the morning on my first reconnoitre. My initial idea was to explore the other side of the River Exe - the Dawlish side that is. I'd never really got to know the lay of the land after my first journey there. I'd encountered too many enormous fields of maize and slashed hedges - the quick economical way of butchering the countryside. I've often wondered if there are enough people who'd happily take on the job of doing this by hand as it used to be done. Exercising an intimate relationship with nature. Anyway it all seemed soulless that first time so I was not feeling particularly optimistic. 

This might seem like a pointless little quibble of my own - it is however, the way my mind works. When I was a child I lived on the edge of a small village called Grappenhall.

It was very beautiful. I used to walk along the tow path to school

and then down the cobbled street to a - on the whole - happy little village school. But after 3pm and at weekends and holidays I was immersed in the surrounding countryside - where every field had a name and a history and I knew them all. 

Hedges are the boundaries of fields - there was nothing uniform about them back then, all their shapes were unique and their outlines were their defining features, plus of course, they were home to an unseen world of countless wild lives. They all had a certain feel. And that was as much to do with the character of the people who planted the hawthorn and field maples as anything. The ditches were also integral for without them the fields could be water logged, animals could get foot rot, crops would not thrive. The ecology of fields kept on evolving with a natural helping hand from the people who lived off the land and the owners. We all benefited. Times changed.

There is a wonderful book called The Worm Forgives the Plough by John Stewart Collis - you can still buy it - even on Amazon. The house I grew up in had wall to wall books and then more piles of books everywhere else. A literary jungle. I discovered Mr Collis in one of those piles. The modern edition now has an intro by John MacFarlane. On Amazon it is described quite poetically and rightly so as being 'as uncategorizable as it is enchanting.'

As to my house hunting foray - I explored the hinterland on the other side of the river and I loved it all this time - discovering new parts where it seemed that more traditional hedging was done.  Perhaps, most likely in fact, still done with a tractor but somehow with care and a sharper blade. I even found an incredibly picturesque seat down a long, winding lane. My own Country Seat.

Yet it was almost impossible to actually sit on as Queen Anne's Lace and Campion had begun to entwine through the lichen covered wooden slats. A perfect place with only the sound of bird song and the wind. Then a tractor and the postman but then again - solitude - heaven - surrounded only by the fields, trees, breezes, birdsong and hedges.

The little town of Dawlish encompasses such a variety of people. A little bit more socially diverse than Topsham, though it's still what I think of as Enid Blyton Land. 

Most of the West of England is in fact, i.e - not at all culturally or racially diverse. Sleepy on the outside and with a nod to tradition but as I have come to realise, as is every other community in the United Kingdom, sharply divided between the two same groups that were exposed during the referendum that we have since called Brexit - if you've ever wondered why we actually call it Brexit click the link. 

This sharp divide really only became apparent to most of us after the count. We are now a nation divided but of course we always were. I think it's better to have it out in the open. We can now see more clearly where people's interests lie. In a way it was already obvious - especially and much more accurately if we look into the interesting world of digital data. It's there if we care to dig. Or perhaps the term should be mine, data mining. Such an interesting world for those who have invested interests. 

When I was growing up I frequently overheard the term 'They' - as in They know best or They decide these things. I of course asked who 'they' were but no one ever seemed to be able to explain but 'they' continued to be referred and deferred to. 

So here I will use the word 'They' and if you care to you can follow the link. I can't of course guarantee it will take you anywhere other than round in circles.  They  'use the same techniques as Aristotle and Hitler ... We appeal to people on an emotional level to get them to agree on a functional level.' 

And of course. Why not? It works. We give our permission on the back of a digital map. Every time. I have often considered whether our world would be best served by a meritocracy or a democracy of a kind. One formed by programming the best, ethical and moral perspectives beyond politics or religion. It is all happening, all evolving beneath the dirt of TV soap. A black comedy? We all hope not. I like to dig around on the internet. Explore it's hinterland. 

I think I must say that I grew up on Enid Blyton, well to begin with. I liked her comforting yet exciting tales. Castle of Adventure etc. Though she was not discovered at home but in the library that we were lucky to have around the corner. Books were impossible to escape from - thank goodness. And the smell of them was divine, liked dried hay on a summer's day. Enid Blyton who gleamed so enchantingly into our lives.

We lived in an entirely different time then. Just after WW2 we needed escapism and reassurance and she knew how to provide it. Since I've got to know about her and her writing methods I'm very intrigued.  She says that "I shut my eyes for a few minutes, with my portable typewriter on my knee – I make my mind a blank and wait – and then, as clearly as I would see real children, my characters stand before me in my mind's eye ... The first sentence comes straight into my mind, I don't have to think of it – I don't  have to think of anything." "If I tried to think out or invent the whole book, I could not do it. For one thing, it would bore me and for another, it would lack the 'verve' and the extraordinary touches and surprising ideas that flood out from my imagination." 

When I'm writing fiction, that is exactly how I write too. No plotting. Some researching and travelling to absorb the atmosphere but all else is a revelation.  I am never bored, the world of the imagination and all that the world of inspiration brings makes boredom impossible. 

I did actually find a house in Dawlish that day that was a possibility, so felt more optimistic and a little safer. I 'followed my nose' as the saying goes - always the best way I find and walked - taking the roads that seemed to have that certain feel about them. I can't explain it any other way. It has happened so often in my life and I've nearly always ended up in the next place that I am going to live in or it has been a short next step to it. I have moved house so very often. It's one of life's journeys in itself.

So along the road I parked on and down a narrow road that dipped downhill until I came to a little bridge over a wide brook and into a park. I turned left and found a row of houses that backed onto the brook, in fact called Brook Street. I liked the feel of the place, rather quirky and quiet and all very individual looking little homes. I walked down following the brook into the town centre and straight into an estate agents. I explained my position and the woman said "We have a property coming up on Brook Street soon." I hadn't got round to mentioning Brook Street. I left and went to pin point the exact house, then got a coffee at a little French cafe and continued to explore. I love allotments so was delighted to see a possibility for me here as the only draw back to the house in Brook St was that it only had a courtyard garden.

My own position whilst house hunting is really defined and very much underlined because I have an old black Labrador - Bella and an even older cat called (Fizz) in tow. Not easy to accommodate nowadays. It really does mark a line that can be almost impossible to cross. 

Buy to Let and Airbnb has meant that mortgage companies and banks can often stipulate the terms and as a result it is usually - 'No Animals' - sometimes even 'No Children'. The owners of this house were retired farmers and naturally accepted animals as part of family life. 

This by the way, is Fizz. One of the reasons as to why house moving can be the most difficult obstacle game in the book. He's very strong willed and always insists on perching in precarious places. He tends to combine perching with posing and is excellent at both. He's 18 years old now and does like sleeping. I think he spends most of his time in his own feline heaven and wakes only to demand food. He's also excellent at letting his desires be known and thinks nothing of waking me up by yowling loudly at my bedroom door and insisting that I follow him downstairs to the fridge, where he then proceeds to drum on the door with his front paws until I give him whatever it is he thinks is in there. 

I must make a Fizz and Bella a page of their own. 

I have so many photos of him perched or/and posing. He is a lovely elderly gentleman now though still with a tendency to attack very viciously if you should go to a certain spot on his left hip, a place no-one can quite pin point. He was attacked by a badger when he was a teenager. He survived as you can see. He doesn't have arthritis. Somehow I always think of him as a 'she' with a very bad temper.

Meanwhile I had to get back to work in my studio - sorting a few boxes every day - sorting and tidying in the house and garden - a little everyday again. Trips to the charity shops and to the recycling centre. And working - making jewellery and telling my friends that I would be leaving. I've made some quite amazing friends in Topsham. But I don't see it as 'goodbye'. Topsham is still in Devon and I love all of Devon - in fact all of the West Country. I see it all as my own back garden. Much as I see the world. In the meantime this was the view from my studio window - never to be forgotten.

APRIL 2019 - In and Out of the Studio

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In and Out of The Studio 

I have an old wooden box

Of powdered metallic pigments in the studio - beautifully stored in delicate glass phials. They have diagonally cut cork stoppers that are covered when unopened with soft kid leather that is then secured with waxed linen twine and tied with a small very tight little knot. A work of art in themselves. 

The majority of the colours are  in a range that is soft and subtle, reminiscent of the 1920's and 30's. Though some appear to be pale until opened as time and daylight have faded them against the walls of the glass phials. Only the tiniest amount is needed to make a dramatic impression and to add a further dimension - really quite magical. I layer them on with sign writer's gold size. It adds a certain lustre when juxtaposed against ink or gouache. The addition of resin later on brings an extraordinary dimension. My work is about many things - looking deeply and being aware of the fleeting moment are two of them.

These metallic pigments were always in the house when I was growing up though I was only allowed to look at them. I remember being most impressed by the delicate kid leather and how it was wrapped around the cork with the cord. We had hundreds of books and magazines of various kinds - National Geographic being one so

had read and knew about goats and leather and about cork trees and corks and it seemed such a wonderful and extraordinary endeavour to me that there were such people in the world who spent their time making them - bringing together all these things - kid leather, corks, delicate glass, twisted linen thread - school had taught me where that came from and how it was made when we learned about Ancient Egypt, and then the black and gold printed labels carefully glued on each one telling a different story - not to mention the alchemical contents - where were they all from? This may have led to my interest in finding out how things are produced and by whom and how these people lived. There you have the world in a nut shell. Who had conspired to bring them all together? But when I was very small, frankly all I wanted to do was to sprinkle the stuff on my hair. Thank goodness I was only allowed to look. I was quite literally 'away with the fairies' - probably as a result of all those beautifully illustrated fairy stories that where piled up in books around my bedroom. 

Fairy stories 

In the words of - Albert Einstein - 'If you want your children to be bright, read them faery tales. If you want them to be brilliant, read them even more faery tales.'

The metallic powders were made by Winsor and Newton in the 1920's so now is a good time for them to see the light of day once more. The most beautiful things are often half hidden from view. Hidden treasures. 

the perfect hideaway

As to studios - 

The one above is not one of mine though is probably my bench mark in terms of my ideal garden shed though. It is in France.
I have had quite a few studios - in the same way as I have had rather more homes than most people - on average.
I have tried different ways of working - space wise. In the home and away from it. Personally I like to leave the house (flat, caravan etc) and 'go to work'. 
Only yesterday whilst I was working in my present studio - it's an old wooden summerhouse, surrounded by birdsong and views across the river - I realised that I have almost come full circle, well

a small circle at least. Albeit, in terms of that feeling you get when in a small wooden shed - that fragile privacy, the closeness of nature and that smell - damp and musty in winter and burnt toasty in summer. Being able to hear the birds sing or the rain pelting on the roof, the wind rattling the window panes. I love it all.

There is a place to paint outside when the weather is reasonably fine and a long seat to gather round with family for breakfast, lunch and supper, a perfect place for a catch up with friends and neighbours, even a little beach for stretching out and lounging in the sun - a little sun trap 

and a spot for coffee first thing in the morning. I have no complaints. Though once again it is a temporary perch and as always I am making the best of it. So I am also imagining my next studio. Really the studio comes first, then the garden and then the house in my list of priorities.

In the studio I can pretty much do all I need to do to create my papier-mâché jewellery. Apart from computer work and marketing as the internet is very iffy. Packing up orders could and often does happen in the kitchen too though our old cat Fizz can be a tad to inquisitive and friendly - he is very hairy. He's now 17 years old and set for 27 I think. When he finds his spot he will stay for days.

My first private space was the empty chicken house at the end of the garden when I was about nine years old. I had grown up with those hens, they all had names, though some were more memorable than others. Some had definite personalities whereas some not so much. There was 'Queeny' because she was the Queen, she was a Light Sussex -

photo courtesy of  Forde Abbey - Instagram
as my old hen has long since departed

and a grown up in the world of hens. But she was also very adaptable and compliant and would happily allow me to dress her in my doll's clothes and strap her into the doll's pram and walk her up and down the road on which I lived. I didn't see the point of dolls. As all the hens - Oily, Beaky, Browny, Whitey etc gradually died of old age, they were buried underneath rose bushes. Then one day the need for my own 'house' began to grow inside me. I cleaned out the wooden chicken house, white washed the walls, I even pasted scraps of wall paper rather reminiscent of the stripy, flowery painting at the beginning of this post. There was even a window that I cleaned and made curtains for. I put down strips of carpet and made a bed from up turned boxes, brought in a small table and a chair and voila. 

Jam jars filled with flowers from the garden mixed with wild flowers from walks to the woods. And books and paintings of course. The need to decorate. It was very cosy. I loved it and so did my friends. It was our den but in my head it was also my studio. I began my first 'blog' there in fact - A newspaper - hand written - we became reporters and would ask the neighbours for their news, then write it down and sell it back to them for a penny a paper. I had almost forgotten that episode. Hidden treasures.

Having a studio is essentially an attempt to create your own very personal and private space. In my mind I imagine that everyone should have one and that all living spaces ought to be able to provide that space for the people who live there. Utopia. 
* I have think I have just heard my first Cuckoo - surely not - it is April and apparently they don't sing until May. Plus I live in the South West and Cuckoos tend to migrate North. Ah well, imagination is my second home.

In the meantime as I like to choose - somewhat by necessity - to rent the places that I live in. Renting offers so much more scope for the imagination. I have lived in an assortment of places - very old, historically interesting places, a folly, fishermen's cottages, old farm houses, very modern flats, caravans, a hopper shed though only for a summer, a converted church, a couple of baroque villas and various houses and apartments. I always seem to get that feeling that change is on its way after three years. Suddenly I sense it, there is something in the air. I have it now. It is exciting. Change is exciting. Though not for everyone I know. Fizz our very superior cat is thankfully very adaptable.

So the studios have also changed. Often they have been where I have lived though sometimes cabin fever takes a hold and I long to 'go to work' to travel somewhere specific and be more conventional, though there will always be a spill over studio at home as well and then excuses are found and I stay at home. Though every April and towards the end of September I get that desire to take flight and head for - in my case - the South of France - hopefully I will make it tis year.

My present studio is one of the best and even more so as now the huge oak tree that hangs over from next door is filling up with birds singing all day long. In the evening the water birds call out across the river in the reed beds, plaintive, other worldly. So I am feeling very blessed.

At the opposite end of this studio spectrum is the one a few years ago in a weird industrial complex that had concrete block divisions that did not reach the ceiling and all the noises mingled above. I played French Impressionist piano music on my laptop in an attempt to bring balance against heavy metal. But eventually resorted to headphones. 

When I took Bella (our family Black Labrador) out for her walks I would try to ignore the piles of rubbish and broken fences and imagine that I was walking in Capri along via Tragara.

It worked perfectly though not a patch on the real thing. I have had a life long love affair with Capri and have yet to find my studio there. It will happen. 

CHARVIN - with thanks to Kevin Broughton and Ned Elliott @ GREEN and STONE

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Why use staples, when you’ve got tacks!

- with thanks to  Kevin Broughton and  Ned Elliott 

@ GREEN and STONE - echoing my love of Charvin who I first 

discovered by chance one day whilst exploring the alleys and the 

streets of Nice.

'It’s sunny, my skin is being gently caressed by the sun and my hair

is flowing handsomely in the sea wind. I am driving somewhere along 

the Cote d’Azur having eaten something delicious at a small seaside 

restaurant. 

My car is a gleaming scarlet convertible from the Golden Age of 

Motoring. It is very expensive and I am gliding across the landscape 

like a knifeful of strawberry jam across a freshly sliced piece of 

buttered baguette. I can’t help but look in the rear-view mirror and 

think how damn gorgeous I am.

However, I am soon distracted, an unmistakable smell penetrates
the salty pine-infused air. My heart is suddenly stung by memories
of disappointment, rejection, dashed hopes, ah, yes, art school!

But no, there is more, I remember my unwavering love of painting!
Suddenly I am filled with the electric buzz of seeing a picture come
to life. ‘What is it! What is that smell! What is it!’ I scream from
my beamer. It is the smell of fresh poppy oil, but what exactly,
Oh yes, Charvin, it is you, I love you! I do!'


This introduction was written from my cold bedroom.
I do not have a car, and I have never been to the south of France.
But I have smelt poppy oil, and I have used Charvin. 

And so, this blog is about Charvin, whose essence I have hopefully captured in this paradisaical opener.

At Green and Stone we sell several types of oil paint including Michael Harding, Sennelier, Winsor and Newton and Blockx.

All of them are good, but the most unusual of the paints is Charvin.
Charvin is solely made on the French Riviera. Much of the products charm lies in its heritage. It is a family business run by Bruno and Laurence Charvin and relies on recipes from 1830. It was popular with such greats and lovers of sunlight, Cezanne, Bonnard, and Ambrogiani.

Charvin sells both fine and extra fine oil colours. The difference between the two being that the extra fine oil is milled twice as long as the fine oil, with discrepancy on timings for each pigment. The machine used is a Buhler Swiss Three-Cylinder which is typically used for the manufacture of high-end cosmetics. The outcome is an incredibly smooth oil paint with a thick, creamy texture. 

In the extra fine range there are a staggering two-hundred-and-eight colours of which Green and Stone sells ninety-six and which is constantly changing. This means Charvin oil paints have the widest range of colours in the world including such delights as ‘Cyclamen’, ‘Absinthe’ and ‘Mummy Brown’.

Whereas Sennelier relies on safflower oil, and Michael Harding on linseed oil, Charvin uses poppy oil. By choosing this oil the paints have a lovely shine, are excellently lightfast and should age without any yellowing. 

With their buttery and fine texture, the paints are perfect for the traditional Flemish painting style headed by such estimable figures as Jan van Eyck and Rogier van der Weyden. However, they are equally suitable for painting using colour shapers and palette knives, whilst the small 20ml tubes are ideal for the keen traveller and plein air painter. 

Charvin paints are also unusual in that they mostly come in mixed colours, in stark contrast with Michael Harding who emphasises the importance of pure single pigments. Charvin are aware of this and suggest the artist picks their colours carefully and that they do not overmix them, as they warn they will take on a shade of grey upon drying.

The understated jewel in the Charvin crown of rainbow jewels is their oil-primed linen canvas, whether on the roll or ready-made. The linen is of a medium to rough grain with a characterful texture which reminds one of the sorts of canvases someone like Walter Sickert would use. 

The ready-made canvases come in traditional French portrait formats, as well as squares and elongated rectangles. They are handmade by talented Frenchmen who deftly wack copper tacks into the sides and firmly stamp ‘CHARVIN’ onto the back. The result is a canvas of the highest quality with a rigid structure and evocative 19th century look.

Why use staples, when you’ve got tacks!

The final aspect of Charvin which makes it so excellent is the philosophy of the owners. Indeed, Charvin are very much a business on an ethical crusade. In their own words they are a family business ‘rejecting the plasticization, consumerism and delocalised mass production to which the world of fine arts is engulfing’. 

With a business model they consider ‘utopian or crazy’ they have chosen to use raw materials only of the highest quality without any real economic outlook at their cost. They are against people who
only think of profits and margins, who make low-quality products for low-cost countries, simply to gain a foothold in the market without regard for the ethical consequences and the repercussions for art itself. They work for authentic values and true products of meaning.

As part of this crusade Charvin have stressed what they are against. In brief, they are against; colour range reductions (hence their rainbow colour range); the use of average ingredients; cotton canvas – an unreliable material over time, lacking the charming texture of linen. 

Why use cotton, when you’ve got linen! 

And finally, they are against online shopping. Arguing it means the end of advice, replaced only by a better price – thus resulting in a user who cannot progress in their work. The knowledge of generations being lost little by little.

And so, long may Charvin reign in the sunny south of France. A beacon of artistic heritage and quality artistic production, keeping the French oil painting tradition very much alive for all the world.

By Ned Elliott

Bruno Charvin Artist's Oils from Green and Stone - Chelsea