Rabbit-skin glue

In traditional oil painting as practiced by the Renaissance painter, skin glue was used to seal the canvas.

Renaissance artists also knew that pure size (hide glue) became brittle once dry, and would mix it with oil and chalk to make a "half-ground" for canvases.

As an adhesive, rabbit-skin glue is used in the production of the bellows of concertinas, and in other smaller, light instruments—prominently in violins.

Its supreme advantages are very fast bonding and easy debonding with hot water, if an instrument must be disassembled for internal repairs.

For example, guitar bridges are subject to high lateral stresses that, with the wrong glue, can lead it to creep forward.

Furthermore, since the glue only works by microscopically stitching the wood fibers together, any gaps in the joint are not going to be successfully filled, and so the mating surface must be very smooth.

[2] Rabbit-skin glue is considered to be a major cause of cracking in oil paintings by most modern conservators.

Modern substitutes for rabbit-skin glue are available, such as Gamblin's PVA size [3] and Golden Acrylics’ GAC100.