Powder Coating and Powder Metallurgy are base industrial processes for coating metal and making materials with powder metals instead of the standard painting methods. I've been playing with metal pigments in different materials and making a faux photographic process using steel, which rust, for the lighter tones of an image. Ideally the pigments provide a more resistant surface for weathering than do epoxy, acrylics or resins by themselves, but that would only be true if the rusting process stops. I haven't bothered to apply a top coat or sealant to the oxidized surface because I don't want to change the look and feel of the light rust. Is there a state of oxidation for metal when it is stable as rust, which would mean that I am just making yellow metal?
I have iron oxide yellow available as a color, but it does not have the depth and shades that putting a layer of steel and watching it rust has. The mystery just isn't there if I start with the final color. This is the way in which this process is sort of like photography. With photographs it is always a mystery when you put the paper in the developer and watch the image appear while the chemicals react with the exposed paper. The same is true when I coat a layer of steel with wet salt and wash it off. The lighter steel coated areas slowly appear more and more yellow as they dry and create a contrast with the black areas.
I have started making whole sheets of vinyl sticker paper coated with steel and oxidized as a substrate for printing or spray painting on. I am not sure if the process is worth it, but it does have potential for making a bunch of sheets in this way that I can use later and not have to keep going through the task of making the rusted metal sheets every time I want to use this process.
My first idea was to use wood for the substrate, then I switched to canvas before I moved to vinyl sticker paper. Vinyl sticker paper is not exotic or fancy in any way, but when I think about the potential applications I consider it a very versatile substrate. The designs and printing methods I use only make a thin layer or veneer that is the image in a graphic. Substrates like canvas, wood, cement and plaster are holders for these materials to give them body and strength. I like some of these materials, but each one of them then has to be put into something or finished in a way that would make them useful and that takes additional time that often feels like more work than making the pieces themselves.
I like making images, but don't like making finished things. This has always been a problem of mine. In college I used butcher paper for screen printing and my teacher ignored my work. In photography lab I didn't matte my prints in the standard way and I was blocked from the group exhibit with the rest of the class. This is of course why I liked the punk rock aesthetic when it rolled around and the idea of zines and such. T-shirts only work for me because they are somewhat finished and I am just adding a design on top. The problems associated with framing and mounting are by and large too much for me to keep working on designs and sticker paper will allow me to print and cut or file the work and not worry too much about the final touches. As stickers these types of prints can also be used by others in a quick way, although I am not sure how this would help the value of the work.
The main difference and problem with vinyl versus paper or another medium is that the layers cannot penetrate the top surface and bond with the substrate in the way that materials and pigments embed themselves into canvas, plaster and paper. The entire bond with the vinyl is contained in the chemical hardening on top of the vinyl and then the pigments being layered into and on top of the vinyl paper. I have been able to remove a thin layer of epoxy and other materials from the vinyl like a flexible layer of latex, so these pieces are literally only skin deep. But versatility over substrate is my call to action today. I can always make these pieces on thicker mediums and more permanent objects later. For now I am working on vinyl as if it was a fine quality archival substrate like the finest rice papers from Japan.
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