I purchased a premade gesso that contains rabbit skin blue and white team just don't know how much water to add to this what Do you think the ratio should be
No, it wouldn't. Gilder's Gesso, used for traditional water gilding, uses rabbit skin glue for it's strength and flexibility to move with the wood over time. The calcium carbonate works well as the filler allowing the gold to be later burnished. No gesso no burnish. Paint can be used, however, under oil gilding, a separate process for gilding.
Rabbit collagen glue is very strong, but it has very poor flexibility in certain environments. Modern polymers are much more flexible and less likely to crack.
Hi Bob, Modern polymers do offer benefits in areas of conservation, I agree. But rsg is used throughout the industry and its flexibility for use in gilding is one reason it's used. Stress crack mechanisms can indeed occur over time, mainly through fluctuation of humidity. Perhaps you're confusing the two methods of mordant/oil gilding with traditional water gilding. Kolner does offer an acrylic based system for water gilding but the traditional method has no comparison to any other method for gilding wood. Any paint medium under leaf would work underneath oil gilding which I also do but gessso with rsg, water, and calcium carbonate (or marble dust by some) is what's used for water gilding.
Depends on what you have in mind. As a decorative finish, traditional water gilding has no equal. There are simply things you can do with gold that is water gilded that cannot be achieved any other way with it's subtleties, warmth of tone and lack of oxidizing above 22k.
