Frottage

DEFINITION

A process of making a rubbing from a raised or textured surface, it involves laying paper over the surface and using black lead, charcoal or crayon for rubbing. Max Ernst used the technique in his Surrealist collages as did other Surrealists because the textural effects stirred unconscious images in the imagination. Source: Kimberley Reynolds and Richard Seddon, "Illustrated Dictionary of Art Terms"<br><br> French term, meaning to rub a crayon or other tool onto paper or other material, which is placed onto a textured surface, in order to create the texture of that surface on the paper. The Surrealist artist Max Ernst used this technique in some of his collages.<br><br>The technique of rubbing with crayon or graphite on a piece of paper which has been placed over an object, or an image achieved in this way. Also simply referred to as rubbing. Such impressions are usually made from such highly textured subjects as leaves, wood, wire screen, gravestones, and manhole covers. It was a technique especially employed by surrealists, one of whom, Max Ernst (German, 1891-1976), first introduced frottage in his works in 1925, often employing such rubbings as part of a collage, or combining frottage with painting techniques.(pr. fr&#601;-TAHZH)Quote: Max Ernst said he was inspired to use frottage by some floorboards, "the grain of which had been accentuated by a thousand scrubbings . . . I made from the boards a series of drawings by placing on them, at random, sheets of paper which I began to rub with black lead. In gazing attentively at the drawings thus obtained . . . I was surprised by the sudden intensification of my visionary powers and by the hallucinatory succession of contradictory images superimposed, one upon the other, with the persistence and rapidity peculiar to amorous memories. My curiosity awakened and astonished, I began to examine indiscriminately, using by the same means, all sorts of materials found in my visual field: leaves and their veins, the frayed edges of a bit of sackcloth, the brushstrokes of a &#39;modern&#39; painting, a thread unwound from a spool, etc." Example: English (Barlow, Derbyshire), Memorial to Robert and Margaret Barley, 1467, incised brass plaque, represented by frottage. Robert Barley is wearing the Yorkist collar of suns and roses is shown, attesting the deceased&#39;s connections with the Yorkist royal line. Brass rubbing in Britain has become so popular, and caused such wear to old plaques, that access to most original brasses has been restricted. Today, those interested are typically charged fees for making rubbings from resin reproductions. See costume, lacuna,and memorial.Related link: Sanford, a manufacturer of artists&#39; materials, has posted a lesson on making rubbing landscapes with crayons or oil pastels. Also see bricolage, collage, coulage, d?coupage, femmage, fumage, gyotaku, montage, parsemage, and photomontage.