Transmissão do conhecimento e circulação da informação em um livro de receitas de vernizes do século XVIII

Abstract

The recipe book Arte de Brilhantes Vernizes was written by João Stooter, in the first half of the 18th century, in Portugal. The work was first published in 1729 by the renowned printing house of the Verdussen family, based in Antwerp. Dedicated to master turners, painters, sculptors and other Portuguese artists, the main objective of the book was to teach them how to give an aesthetic finish to their works, with comparable quality to what was being done in the cities of Amsterdam, London and Paris. The author has carefully gathered the description of a wide range of ingredients from distinct parts of the world, with the identification of woods, oils, resins, gums and natural dyes, materials for sanding and finishing pieces of wood, metal, ivory and coquilho; recipes for varnishes, tinctures and ornamentation techniques, which are presented with the quantities and preparation procedures. This research aims to understand the transmission mechanisms and circulation of information in the field of art, from a copy of the first edition of Arte de Brilhantes Vernizes belonging to the collection of Erfgoedbibliotheek Hendrik Conscience, in Antwerp, which contains highly relevant writed notes inserted by the author. A study was carried out on the mechanisms adopted by João Stooter to transmit artisanal knowledge through writing, at a time when teaching was largely carried out within the workshops. Therefore, we sought to analyze the informational content of the book and reproduce selected recipes. The methodology involved the analysis of the informational content of the book and the reproduction of selected recipes, where it was possible to verify which were the textual strategies adopted by João Stooter and if they were efficient in sharing knowledge, in addition to establishing relationships between the raw materials used by the author and the ingredients used in the reproductions of the recipes. Through the survey of materials and techniques presented by João Stooter and comparative analyzes with the texts written by the Jesuit priests João Daniel in his Tesouro descoberto no Rio Amazonas and in João Felipe Bettendorff's Crônica da Missão dos padres da Companhia de Jesus no Estado do Maranhão, it was carried out a study on the circulations, transfers and displacements of information in the universe of the arts between different places and cultures, bringing evidence in relation to raw materials from tropical forests and the techniques adopted by the native peoples of Brazil, which contributed to the development of the arts in the Modern World. The work concludes with the presentation of a glossary, which aims to assist in the understanding of the book Arte de Brilhantes Vernizes through the restitution of terms presented in its recipes.