HISTORY

Aqua-Resin, the product, was first developed in the 1970’s by the current owner and president of the Aqua-Resin Company, Louis Lieberman. Louis, at that time, was a full time sculptor using polyester resin and fiberglass almost exclusively to make his work.

It soon became apparent to Louis and other artists working with polyester resin, that not only was it unpleasant to work with: penetrating and lingering odor, burning eyes, skin rashes, etc., but it was in fact significantly dangerous to one’s health.

Louis, already feeling the negative health effects of polyester resin and not wanting to stop making his art, turned for some time to making sprayed cast paper, but after a while, decided he needed to further his work with something less ephemeral in appearance than paper. So with a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design, and also a BA in Biology/Chemistry from Brooklyn College, he decided to formulate his own sculpting material.

Besides needing something with the intrinsic strength to hold up as a sculpting material, Louis had two other primary criteria: it had to be safe to use and it had to be a permanent (archival) art material. After many trials, hours of research, and much testing, Louis met his criteria and came up with what is basically the same formula that is in production today.

The specific properties of the material needed by Louis for his own work as an artist, not surprisingly, were also useful not only to much of the artist community but also found receptive customers in such diverse fields as architectural restoration, scenic design, product prototyping, etc. The additional benefit of being a very safe to use material of course led to even wider acceptance.

The company, with the DBA Aqua Resin®, began with its incorporation in 1993 with Louis and his brother Paul as partners. It has gone through a few different incarnations of incorporated ownership over the years, but always with Louis continuously as the primary director of operations and production, as he still is today.