“The last step seeks well-planned giornata;
Compels fresco artist to plot a
Considered depiction
In workday’s restriction,
Avoiding time-limit errata!”
The last of the three fresco-cycle limericks from NaPoWriMo2024 was posted on 17 April 2024 and focused on the final step: carbonation, or carbonatation. Since I’ve used the name of this particular step as a punchline in a previous poem, I instead focused this limerick on a related concept: the time required for this last step to occur and the fresco image to thus become set.
“The last step seeks well-planned giornata…”
Giornata means “a day’s work” in Italian. In fresco art, it means the amount of lime plaster that an artist covers with pigment during a day. This is due to the specific chemistry of the carbonatation step, represented symbolically here:
Ca(OH)2 (l) + CO2 (g) → CaCO3 (s) + H2O (l)
This reaction is key to the buon fresco (“true fresco”) art form. If an artist paints on the intonaco layer of the fresco with pigments in water, the surface [consisting of calcium hydroxide, Ca(OH)2] then reacts with the carbon dioxide (CO2) in the surrounding air, forming a stable calcium carbonate structure around the pigments and ensuring the longevity of the work. The artist would thus want to lay down only enough of the intonaco layer that could be covered with pigment in the same session.
“Compels fresco artist to plot a /
Considered depiction /
In workday’s restriction…”
I have written before about how the rules of poetic structures (such as limericks) have been a help in terms of re-starting my own creative writing processes. I can imagine both that having to deliberately consider each giornata might help a fresco artist plan their work AND that such a restriction might be considerably more time-intense and frustrating than “five lines and an AABBA rhyme scheme.”
“Avoiding time-limit errata!”
Mistiming a giornata could be addressed, since fresco artists could also use the technique of fresco a secco (“dry fresco”). As its name suggests, this technique involves painting on a dried fresco surface (directly on the already-formed calcium carbonate).
However, the potential rhyme of “giornata” and “errata” proved impossible to resist, here.
Chemphasis 