Tom Robertson Quartz Ground - 40ml

Ground by hand in small batches by Tom Robertson

“Travel back in time with my interpretation of Rembrandt’s historical Quartz Ground. It offers a drastically different way of working compared to modern conventional grounds such as acrylic gesso and is made from a whitish clay earth, exhibiting a relatively high quartz content and is bound in cold pressed linseed oil. Price per single 40 ml tube.

This is an absorbent ground that will tolerate a lot of punishment and is well suited for impasto and glazing - it’ll grab paint and won’t slip and slide as modern acrylic gessoes are prone to do.

Best applied in a single layer over a glue size, using a blunt knife. It can be smoothed over for a fine surface or worked roughly and pairs exceptionally well with my Lead White Substitutes, where the tooth and grab of this ground lets the paint really shine.”

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We have tested these grounds on a canvas with coats of acrylic size with no problem, oil colour imbues beautifully with these grounds and also dry quicker than on top of acrylic gessos.