Sean -> RE: Something caught my eye (Nov. 2 2011 2:49:00)
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The maker is Juan Montero Aguilera, a Spanish luthier for the past 50+ years. The craftsmanship is clean, the drop of glue on the ends of the fan braces is indeed common old school. What stands out is the white substance painted on the soundboard, which is smeared a little on some of the top lining in places. The fan struts are spruce, you can see a big difference in the colour between the fan struts and the soundboard which has no apparent grain lines. This paduak negra could be either cedar or spruce as the site the picture is from has one of each for sale. Now for my guess on what this white paint like substance could be. Gesso popped into my head for some reason, it's used in the art world by painters as a primer and canvas stiffener, it's also white. I looked up gesso, the original formula is basically chalk and thinned out hide glue, thinner then paint. Could this be a cedar top negra with gesso painted on the inside of the soundboard as some kind of stiffener or hardener? Has anyone heard of such a thing, rumours, old stories from the past perhaps?
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