Janel Pahl Encaustics

Welcome! Thank you for stopping in. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate in reaching out to me on the contact page. If you are unfamiliar with encaustics, below is a brief description of this beautiful medium. Enjoy!

Encaustic literraly means to “burn in”, from the Greek word enkaustikos. This name comes from the fact that in encaustic, each layer must be fused with heat to the layer beneath it. The base medium which is used for encaustic is primarily made from beeswax. The wax is mixed with damar resin, which is a crystallized sap from fir trees. The resin provides hardness. Encaustic medium is durable and archival, due in great part to the fact that beeswax is impervious to moisture. Because of this, they will not yellow or darken with time.

Encaustic medium is very unpredictiable during the creative process and can be affected by different circumstances, such as a very cold day vs. a hot day. That is the beauty of encaustics. It has a life of its own. So when you see little lines, dents and irregular surfaces, it is just the medium doing its’ thing, which for me, is the beauty of it.