This master’s thesis studies the painting technology used in the Roman ceiling fresco from the Museum Square in Celje. It is an approximately 2000-year-old vaulted ceiling fresco, which is part of a Roman villa discovered at said location. In addition to the fragments of ceiling frescoes, 18m² of in situ preserved wall paintings were discovered, reaching a height of up to 1.3 meters, as well as around 70,000 fragments of wall paintings from different periods.
Scientific investigations have revealed the presence of wax in the paint layer, suggesting that the painting may have been created using the encaustic technique. The use of encaustic in ancient wall art has long been a subject of debate, but it is difficult to confirm. Identifying wax as a binder for pigments is problematic due to numerous conservation and restoration interventions carried out over the past centuries when wax was also used as protection for frescoes. The word encaustic derives from the Greek word encaustikos (ἐγκαυστικός), meaning "to burn" or "to scorch," indicating that heat is required in this method. In addition to said and more widely known hot encaustic technique, historical sources also mention cold encaustic, or the so-called Punic wax, which we assume was used in this case.
The aim of the thesis is to recreate the cold encaustic technique, which would match the original Roman ceiling fresco in terms of both material composition and appearance. The research involved testing various methods and recipes for preparing the cold wax emulsion. Different application methods and surface treatment techniques were also examined. In the final part of the thesis, a copy of a detail of the Roman ceiling fresco was made using the tested cold encaustic technique. The copy was executed on a reed substrate. All layers of the plaster present in the original fragments were also recreated. In this way, the success and applicability of the cold encaustic technique were evaluated and compared to the original fresco.
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