PB Cohen Creations

I have a love/hate relationship with patinas. I like the dimension created when you use them, but I would prefer more control over the process. This will never happen — it's the nature of the chemical reactions involved. So I try to resign myself to the occasionally unexpected results, and do it over (and occasionally over) when I'm not satisfied.

The chemical I use the most is liver of sulfur, and until recently I've only used the lumps or rocks that you dissolve in water as needed. But the supply at the Art Center recently lost its vim and verve, and — oddly enough, in terms of timing — so did mine. I'm not sure what the shelf life of this stuff is, but it isn't forever. Since I needed to finish a piece for the photo shoot, I ended up getting a quart of the ready-made liquid solution, since that's all I could get in town that day. Theoretically, since it's already mixed, I'll be able to get a similar look for all my pieces in the future, instead of getting slightly random strengths inherent in using the lumps. I'm not sure what the shelf life of the liquid is, so I may just try using it more often.

Charles Lewton-Brain wrote a nice tutorial on using liver of sulfur on the Ganoksin web site. The best advice I can give you is to experiment, and not to expect things to work perfectly on the first try ever.

The Art Center recently got some Silver Black, so I'll give a few additional tips on using both of these patinas on silver.

Silver Black turns the silver black almost immediately, which can be very satisfying. Liver of sulfur, on the other hand, requires keeping either your solution or the piece warm, and dipping repeatedly. It's a slow process. You can also paint the Silver Black onto your piece with a paintbrush, which gives you some very nice control over exactly where the "black" goes. Not so with the liver of sulfur.

A black Sharpie magic marker works as a resist for both chemicals. However, the heat required for the liver of sulfur can render the Sharpie marker a little less resistant. Rubbing alcohol will remove the marker, but remember to rub with paper towel or a cotton swab or something — simple soaking won't take it off. Once the patina is on, any sort of buffing or light sanding or application of steel wool or whatever your tool of choice is works equally well on patinas from both chemicals to polish high points of the metal, leaving lower areas dark.

If the patina turns out completely wrong, you can gently heat a piece treated with liver of sulfur with your torch and the patina will disappear. Not so with the patina from Silver Black — if a torch works at all (and I'm not convinced it does) you have to heat the piece so much that you'll risk losing your solder joins.

Silver Black turns silver black — or at least mostly black. The patina isn't always even, and it's more a dark grey than black. Some people don't think it's as rich a grey/black as you can get with liver of sulfur, but I haven't compared results enough to have an opinion; as far as I can tell they produce similar results if you're going for black. When used carefully and slowly, liver of sulfur will turn silver a range of colors, including browns, blues and greens. None of these colors are as durable as grey/black, though, so you'll have to fuss quite a bit with lacquer or a similar sealant, and even that might not work over the long run.

Both chemicals are toxic and should be used with care, ventilation and probably gloves.

Does anyone else have opinions or tips?