Laura:

If you want to create an authentic "period" image your tinware should
surely LOOK new - not battered through 40 years mis-use and another 60
years in grandma's attic.

This is of course a constant problem - visitors (and even experts, dare I
say it) are so conditioned to seeing deteriorated works of art and objects
that they almost seem to think that Leonardo carefully painted the "Mona
Lisa" with thick, discoloured and patchy varnish over it, obscuring about
90% of the original image underneath.  (Remember the continuing rows about
the removal of 300 years of candle grease and incense smoke from the
Sistine Chapel ceiling?).

Patrick Boylan

P.S. IF you are still determined!... if your tinware is a genuine
reproduction using original techniques and materials it will rust very
readily, so just play football (sorry, soccer!) with it around a few times
on a patch of grass and then leave it outside in wet weather for a few
weeks.  However, I can't advise you on how you should the CONSERVE the
damaged replicas afterwards!  Good luck!

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On Sun, 7 Feb 1999, laura dickstein wrote:

>
> >Can anyone suggest how you might make enamelled tinware look old?  I
> >recently bought some new tinware but for exhibition purposes, I want it to
> >look like it is from the late 19th century.
> >
> >Please respond off-list.
> >
> >Thanks!
> >
>
> *------------*-------------*-----------*
> Laura J. Dickstein
> Arts and Museum Education Consultant
> [log in to unmask]
> *------------*-------------*-----------*
>
>
>