The black I make from soot has started smelling like my mother's kitchen
Yesterday I was grinding lamp black for the outlines, sitting on the floor with the stone as always, and my daughter-in-law came and stood at the door and asked what I am cooking. Nothing is cooking, I said. It is only the soot.
But she is right, the smell is there. I collect the soot from the mustard oil lamp in the prayer room, the one that burns through the evening aarti, and I keep it in an old Bournvita bottle for months before I use it. When I grind it with a little gum and water, the whole room becomes that smell. Mustard oil, a little burnt, little sweet.
My mother did the same bottle, same lamp. She never measured anything. I also do not measure, and my son says this is why I cannot give a rate card for the work, and I tell him some things are not for rate card.
Anyway, the outline on this peacock is going well. Fine as a hair. But I am thinking now the black from this year's soot is a shade warmer than last year's and I cannot decide if I am imagining it or if the oil is different. Anyone else here working with their own lamp black, kindly tell me if it changes for you also. It is a small thing but it is sitting in my head since two days.
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This got me. The fact that your daughter-in-law smelled a kitchen and not a studio says everything, the material is carrying something no paint tube from a shop ever will. I make my own charcoal, just burnt willow in a tin, and it smells like nothing, bonfire at best. Yours smells like a specific evening in a specific house. That's not a quirk of your process, that's the work already starting before you've touched the paper. The bottle on the shelf for months doing its quiet thing, I love that. Do you ever worry it gets too strong and takes over the drawing, or is that the point?
Burnt willow in a tin is honest work, no shame in that. But I think you answered your own question: if the smell takes over the drawing, it is because the drawing was thin to begin with. The material cannot overpower an image that has something to say. In mosaic we have the same argument about strong stone, the deep reds, the gold smalti, people afraid it will eat the composition. It only eats it when the design is weak. What I would watch more is the months in the bottle, the oil residue can turn sticky and you get a different grip on the paper than you planned. Have you tried grinding a small batch fresh and comparing?
Your point about the sticky oil is the one that has stayed with me since yesterday, because you are correct and it is not a small thing. My mother used to say the soot must be "rested" but she never spoke of the oil going bad in the bottle, and I have seen a batch that sat through one whole monsoon come out with a grip I did not like, the line dragging a little where I wanted it to fly. Now I take the fresh soot from the lamp in smaller quantity and use it sooner, and keep the old bottle only for the black that goes under the fill, where the line can be slow.
On the other matter, I will not argue with you, ji. It is a hard saying but I think there is truth in it. If the image is strong, the smell only makes it stronger. If it is thin, then yes, the material will speak louder than the drawing, and that is my failure, not the soot's.
But one thing I will say for the smell, and you may disagree. In our painting the smell is not separate from the picture. The lamp that gives the soot is the same lamp that burns in the prayer room. So when the room smells of mustard oil and burnt wick, the old women who come to see the work do not say "what a strong material." They say "this is the old way." That recognition is worth something to me, more than a clean studio.
Small batch, fresh grind, I have noted it. Thank you for that.
Burnt willow in a tin, that is good, that is honest work. But yes, your point is correct ji, the smell is not a quirk, it is part of the thing itself. In our tradition the soot from the prayer lamp is not just black colour, it has been in the room where the evening aarti was done. So the smell is not separate from the painting.
To your question, sometimes it does get strong, I will not say no. If the gum is more or the soot is fresh, the whole room is heavy with it and my eyes also water a little. But I have learned to keep the bottle capped and take only small quantity, grinding slowly. Too strong and the paper also holds it, then the lines look heavy. So small amount, more patience. That is the point also, but the point should not shout. 🙂