In art form creative and elegant,
A use of chem properties prevalent…
If error avoided,
Then product ovoid is
Example of wax resist, eloquent!
This non-Twitter/Bluesky poem commemorates a fascinating art process I was introduced to last spring: the technique behind making pysanky. (Since the concepts are still relatively new to me, I doubt my ability to be succinct and remain clear: I’ll plan to keep my word limit at 560 words this time.)
“In art form creative and elegant…”
I was lucky to attend a pysanka workshop on campus in Spring 2024 to learn about this creative and elegant artwork from Ukrainian culture. (Pysanka is the singular form of the word; pysanky is the plural.) To sum up any process in an introductory blog post does not do it credit, so I’ll add in some pertinent links here.
In brief, a design is painted on the egg in beeswax, using a stylus that can deliver the wax in a thin line, and the egg is then dyed a color. These two steps are repeated over several layers. At the close of the process, all the wax is melted off, ultimately yielding an egg dyed in a variety of colors. My own amateur attempts are shown here, but I recommend seeking out other images, as the resulting designs can be astoundingly intricate.
“A use of chem properties prevalent…”
I was quite interested in exploring the underlying chemistry that made this possible. While I am still learning, it has seemed likely so far that the dyes used are examples of acid dyes: they are water-soluble and contain functional groups such as carboxylic acids or sulfonic acids that can donate a proton in water, so that the dye molecule takes on a negative charge. Opposite charges attract, forming strong ionic bonds: thus, the negatively-charged dye then works well with protein-based compounds, which are also water-soluble and can form positively-charged species in the acidic dye bath.
Eggshells consist of calcium carbonate and proteins, so they work well with acid dyes. However, beeswax is resistant to such interactions, because it has a primarily hydrocarbon structure, being made of long-chain esters. It is not water-soluble, and it does not have functional groups that can react with water to form anything charged, so it does not bond to an acid dye.
Inherent in the art process are thus a variety of chemical properties of the materials used, such as solubility, miscibility, acid-base reactivity, and bonding.
“If error avoided, /
Then product ovoid is /
Example of wax resist, eloquent!”
I was intrigued throughout the evening by how challenging and invigorating this “experiment” was.
It was necessary to continually aim to create a negative image: the first area covered with wax would preserve the white of the eggshell. After the first dye layer was applied, the second area covered with wax would then preserve the color of the first dye. After the second dye layer was applied, the third area covered with wax would then preserve the color of the second dye, and so on.
I found myself strongly reminded of the retrosynthesis problems I had worked decades before in Organic Chemistry, thinking backward one step at a time, all the way back to the starting material: here, the egg itself. (My own endeavors were quite simple, but expert pysanka artists use a variety of symbols and designs with a wealth of meaning.)
This was in addition to the many practical challenges involved in working with the set-up, since it relied on eggs, dyes, wax, and flames, all providing ample room for error! However, even in my initial attempts, I was quite pleased to see the “product ovoid.”
In researching the technique afterwards, I have likewise been interested to learn more about wax resist generally, seeing the principles that make such processes work from an artistic perspective. (The “wax eloquent” phrase has been on my mind over the past year, given the intricacy and beauty of the sample pysanky that were shared at the 2024 workshop.)
Chemphasis 