What makes a good canvas and why.

Boris01 · Joined: 18 Jun 2008 Posts: 228 Location: Western Australia

update on the hemp canvas ( maybe I should start a new thread )

I went to buy a couple metres to play with and it was on sale, lucky me

what I purchased was "100% hemp hungarian green 14oz"
its really nice stuff, stretches well, RSG seems to make a wierd dark stain as soon as it hits that doesn't fade for a couple days, but dries tight as a drum, strong and still fairly flexible when I tried to bend/roll it, AS oil prime sits great on it and the end result is :
I thought I bought hemp ... this looks like belgian linen ?!

It's REALLY fun to paint on ( I've been painting on very smooth cotton, silly me ) , takes the brush well, but completely unsuitable for the type of work I need to do ( big, detailed etc ). done a few preliminary paintings and it looks like this stuff will be great for the types of paintings I THOUGHT it would be great for - thick brush strokes of oil in the end layers.

to me it doesnt seem suited to the kind of detailed almost photo-realistic paintings of boats and junk that my buyers want , but really appeals to me as the kind of surface that I want to play with and do paintings for ME on, it kinda makes my paintings look more like ... paintings

I found that the rsg didnt soak into the fibres as much, not that it went further but seemed to make a better film, oil prime I needed two coats as opposed to one with cotton canvas. my only problem ( and this is with the raw hungarian green only as far as I can tell from the samples ) was that there was still tiny hard plant fibres all through it that I had to pick out with tweezers, but for the price I cant really complain
I'm sure a more processed hemp ( which I'm gonna go buy tomorrow ) wont have the same problem ( although the one Im gonna get is bleached as far as I can tell )

oh - I hand washed my hemp before I stretched it - big mistake as far as I can tell, all it did was give it random creases everywhere that I couldnt get rid of despite 3 rounds of ironing and drying. maybe the washing machine ( no powder ) next time

Boris01 · Joined: 18 Jun 2008 Posts: 228 Location: Western Australia

So basically if youre thinking of buying some of that pre-primed belgian linen, I'd recommend trying out some thick hemp canvas first - its a very good substitute in terms of feel/texture and look, chews the paint off the brush the same way and looks nice and lumpy/painting-ey when its done

granted , you'll have to stretch, size and prime it yourself, but for about 1/5th the price ...

Stefan Maguran

Where do you get it?

Boris01 · Joined: 18 Jun 2008 Posts: 228 Location: Western Australia

here in Perth I've found two places its available :
"Hemp Wholesale Australia" in Kalamunda,
( www.hempwa.com )

and Hempco in Fremantle mall where I got mine ( also have a shop in margaret river )
( www.hempco.net.au )

Im sure there's more places over east that sell it

marri · Joined: 28 Aug 2009 Posts: 267 Location: Western Australia

OK Boris, I will admit to being wrong. I just checked my largest Mont Marte Professional canvas. It has indeed warped. Crapitty Crap Crap. Looks like I will need to make my own.

Boris01 · Joined: 18 Jun 2008 Posts: 228 Location: Western Australia

not "wrong" Marri, just hopefull that the good deal you think you got on a cheap but great canvas WAS actually a good deal

I only know better cause Ive gone through it before

make your own for sure - its fun and adds more meaning to your work ( well, it does me to mine )

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went back and got two metres of the finer weave 12oz 100% hemp canvas yesterday and stretched it, stretched beautifully, rsg went on better than onto the 14oz hungarian green stuff

left it overnight and woke up thismorning to a horribly rippled canvas - the size had done something wierd but I put that down to not washing the hemp like I did with the previous lot ( and like the girl at the shop told me to do , I was to excited to stretch it )

unpicked all the staples on a 1.5 sqm canvas, restretched, let it sit for a while and just finished the second oil prime coat a couple hours ago - this one turned out BEAUTIFUL despite the initial rippling after the rsg dried

12oz 100% hemp canvas, nice fine weave this is EXACTLY what Ive been looking for,
so long, cheap cotton !

for those of you in Perth / WA, the stuff Ive just been playing with is from "Margaret River Hemp Company" ( the hempco link ), on sale at the moment till the end of the month ( on sale cheaper than wholesale - I know cause I just signed up for a wholesale account ), just leave me 20 metres of each ...

joseph2010 · Joined: 25 Aug 2010 Posts: 1 Location: other

Lameir · Joined: 19 Oct 2010 Posts: 1

Buy a gallon of bad quality gesso. Paint it onto your face, or your tounge if you like. You do one coat in one direction, either vertical or horizontal -then sand it smooth. Do the next coat in the other direction and sand it again. Finish with another coat in the original direction and sand. It is ready for you to paint a jumblebrain snail painting.

There are now books of canvases you can buy. They have no backing, but come in a book like a sketchbook. You can paint those red.

RJW · Joined: 17 Sep 2010 Posts: 16 Location: Sydney

I could never work on Newsagency / $2 Shop "canvas" stretchers. They are cheap and nasty! Sure these are fine for experimentation, but please, if you want to sell your artwork, purchase and paint on quality stretchers....

I build my own stretchers using chamfer cut Tassie Oak hardwood stretcher bar, with 10oz pre primed canvas roll. Stretchers are mitre cut so they are never out of square. Once stretched, I will always recoat the canvas with an additional 2 or 3 hits of gesso to ensure a perfect working surface.

Once the painting is complete, and the edges of the stretcher are painted up, I will seal the whole lot in a gloss varnish. For a full professional finish, I always title and sign the work, and take great care to neatly tape up the back of the stretcher bar. Lastly I add d-rings and/or wire so the work is ready to hang.

If anyone is interested in improving the finish quality of their artwork please let me know. I love nothing more than to see artwork reach its full potential with proper presentation. I am more than happy to help out with advice, but I can also supply most of the above materials too.

brissieframer · Joined: 21 Nov 2010 Posts: 1

I have just been in a heated debate over this with a well known famous artist in australia at the moment. we recently framed one of his works and I was disgusted to see it was painted on a mont marte canvas. This person says they make cheaper versions so everyone can own one. I debated that he was misrepresenting himself to people who did not know the difference. saying simlar works had sold at auction in the thousands. Really I find it insulting to people who take their art seriously. They really are junk. I find when people bring them in to frame they are not square, warped and paint is already flaking off. Most decent framers are accomodating to artists. I know we would much rather offer our customers a better price than see them walk out the door and buy mass produced chinese rubbish. And if other framers are like us we have lots of small off cuts of stretchers that can be bought at cost and made up into small stretchers and then have a nice canvas stretched on them.

Oh this is my first post so please be nice. I have already been sworn at by this "artist"and told I am just a framer and to know my place and as a framer I have no idea about art conservation. lol.

The Pook · Joined: 01 Feb 2007 Posts: 2904 Location: Tasmania

Generally speaking, I agree, yeah, cheap materials are generally not as good and best avoided. But let's not get too precious about it. It's the art that counts. The Australian and French Impressionists used all sorts of crap paints and surfaces to paint on, but that doesn't stop their paintings being great art worth millions. A Rembrandt painted on a cheap chinese canvas with student paints would still be a Rembrandt. A Michaelangelo sculpted from Hebel brick would still be a Michaelangelo.

Devilbiss · Joined: 06 Jul 2007 Posts: 3214

I don't know how bad the actual canvas is on those Mont Marte stretchers but a standard or even good quality canvas can be totally ruined by cheap gesso or primer.
I buy good quality canvas and linen (for portraits) by the roll.
I once fell into the trap of buying a ten litre bucket of gesso because it was cheap. Eckersly's was having a store wide sale and didn't think that they stocked or sold bad quality goods..
I make my own stretcher frames as well and after stretching the canvas I brushed on three coats of the "on sale" gesso.
I had almost completed the painting and was putting the stretched canvas into my easel when it fell to the ground hard on its edge.
The canvas looked fine upon first inspection and the stretcher was still square but when the light fell onto the surface the right way it showed that the gesso...not the oil paint... had fracture lines in it not too different from fracture marks in fibreglass!
Bugger!
I had to keep the painting for my own wall and throw away the gesso that didn't flex.
I frame my own works as well so I can understand the problems that the cheap stretchers present to framers...if you square them up then that usually results in a loose and bucked canvas surface.