Working artist...Canvas building
 | I'm busy in the wood shop building new cradled wood panels for art work planned for this winter. My medium is fiber art, specifically, torn paper collage paintings. I layer lots of paper and glue and more paper and glue on my artwork, so the canvas needs to be a solid, durable substrate. The wood canvases hold great for the weight of the material--traditional fabric canvases tend to sag. |
| There's a lot of "working artist" work that I don't like--namely, paper work and accounting. But wood shop work is totally different--I love the step by step process of building my art canvases! I usually build six to ten panel canvases at a time, so it takes a lot of forethought to consider what sizes to build for the subjects I have in mind. |  |
| My canvases: I use quarter inch birch high grade plywood for the canvas surface and create the cradle--the support structure--from quality one-by (1"x2" sticks, usually 8' long). The sheets come in 4'x8' panels which I have cut down to rough canvas sizes at the building store. I re-cut the sheet edges at home--making cleaner cuts and squaring up pieces. When attaching the top sheet to the cradle support, I glue and air staple. Once the glue dries, the finished canvas is super strong and durable. |  |
 | The staples in the canvas are covered with plastic bond material and sanded after drying. Then the panel is ready to seal with primer paint--important given the wood panel must hold up to lots of wet glue and paper. |
| Once sanded and sealed, the final canvas is ready for art work--my favorite part! |  |
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