Ebru art, whose roots date back to the 10th century, became one of the most important aesthetic arts during the Ottoman period. Ebru art, which progresses through the master-apprentice relationship and has survived to the present day, was frequently used on the covers of hardcover books and to decorate the inside during the Ottoman period. Ebru art has not lost this place over time and has become one of the most popular branches of art. Today, there are millions of ebru art masters all over the world. The best answer to the question of what ebru art is is; ebru is the artist’s reflection of his soul on water. Ebru, which is the art of creativity and dreams coming to life on water, is an art with aesthetic concerns. Beauty and aesthetic appearance come first for ebru art. Creating visually pleasing shapes with the help of paints is a reflection of the imagination of ebru masters. In a way, ebru art is the unique dance of paints with imagination on water, and this dance comes to life on paper. In this article, we will give special advice to those who want to start ebru art and information about the necessary ebru materials.
Getting Started with Ebru Art
First of all, you definitely don’t need to be a professional to start ebru art. Ebru art is for everyone. Today’s famous ebru art masters were not professionals when they started ebru. The important thing for ebru art is to have dreams that can only be poured into water. You don’t need professionalism to make your imagination and aesthetic understanding, your tastes and feelings dance in water with paints. For ebru, it is enough to want to do it.
What Materials Do You Need to Buy for Ebru Art?
The materials you need to buy as a basis when starting ebru art can be listed as; water, paint, gall, brush, boat and paper.
Paper: The most important material for ebru art is definitely the paper you will use. When ebru is made, it is transferred to the paper after shaping it with paints in water. For this reason, since we will transfer ebru from water to paper, it is very important for the paper to have a high water absorbing feature. In other words, 80-90 grams of high-quality pulp papers that can absorb water well are used here.
Water: is one of the most necessary materials required for marbling. One of the important sensitive points to be considered while marbling is that the water to be used for marbling must be lime-free water, if you are going to use tap water while marbling, this water must be rested for a long time and cleaned of lime.
The basin is the environment where the water and tragacanth mixture is located, where the paints and imagination meet their dance, in other words, take shape. The basin to be used while marbling must be a few centimeters larger than the paper size. Because the paper on which the marbling is transferred is a paper with high water absorbency and therefore has a high water absorption power, swelling will naturally occur in the paper that absorbs water. The marbling basin is made of wood or any metal and generally marbling basins with a depth of 4 – 6 cm are used.
All the materials required for marbling are collected in the marbling basin and the art of marbling is performed in the marbling basin.
Tragacanth: It is used to condense the water to be used in marbling. It is a substance obtained from the stem of a plant from the thorny class called tragacanth, which grows naturally in the mountains of Central Asia, and is used for thickening purposes. In order to obtain tragacanth, the branches of the tragacanth plant are first scratched, especially in the summer months, and then the milk flowing from the branches of the plant dries with the summer sun. As a result of this process, the substance called tragacanth, which forms in the form of bone-colored white particles, is collected. Tragacanth is kept in non-calcareous, i.e. non-hard water for two days, and after it is seen that it has completely dissolved, it is filtered with the help of cloth bags and cheesecloths and put into a boat.
Paint: Today, ready-made paints are sold for marbling, these paints are special paints prepared from soil. It is known that in the old days, marbling masters made the paints they would use while performing the art of marbling, and there are various methods to make marbling paint. The crushed soil is sifted with the help of a sieve and turned into powder, then filtered in water. Today, powdered paints are sold ready to be crushed.
Gall: Obtained from the gall bladder of cattle. There is no information about why this interesting mixture is like this and its certainty, but it is known that in ancient times, during the nomadic lifestyle, the gall bladders of animals were used to ferment cheese. Here, soil, water and the fluids secreted from the gall bladder come together as the main elements of this fine art. However, since every invention and innovation is born for different purposes or reasons from society to society, there is no certainty in this information. Brush: Specially made horsehair marbling brushes are used when marbling art is performed. Here, the most important of the marbling brushes The feature is that horsehair does not hold paint. Thus, the paint taken on the brush can be transferred to water more easily and effortlessly, and various shapes can be given in water. If you are also curious about the art of marbling and want to do marbling, you can easily do marbling by having the marbling materials we mentioned here. After purchasing the basic materials required to do marbling art, all that is left is to use your imagination.
