First attempt at stretching a canvas

I confess, I usually buy my canvases ready-stretched, but having heard so many artists extol the financial and other virtues of stretching one's own, I felt that I really must learn this skill. Not least because I had recently experienced problems with a batch of ready-made canvases where the stretcher bars caused a visible crease to appear on the front of the canvases (a lesson learned about quality!)

Materials...

So first things first, I went onto ebay and found this canvas stretching kit....

I also bought a selection of rather nicely-made stretcher bars from the same company.

(For anyone interested, the ebay shop selling these things is here.... http://stores.ebay.co.uk/FRAMABLE)

Next came an internal debate about the pros and cons of different fabrics. There are many options out there.... linen, cotton, polyester.... heavyweight, mediumweight, lightweight... oil primed, acrylic primed, unprimed....

As it turned out, the decision for my first attempt was made for me by a very kind artist named Vincent Shaw-Morton (http://www.shaw-morton.co.uk/) who donated a piece of cotton canvas that he had personally knife-primed with alkyd white followed by a toned ground. What a star!

Instructions...

Next, I looked at several web sites giving tips on how to stretch a canvas, such as:

• http://studiochalkboard.evansville.edu/p-canvas.html


• http://painting.about.com/od/oilpainting/a/stretch_canvas.htm


• http://www.ndoylefineart.com/stretchcan.html


• http://www.wikihow.com/Stretch-a-Canvas
  

First Attempt...

So - having been forewarned that ready-primed canvas is way tougher to stretch than unprimed, I rolled up my sleeves and embarked on my first attempt. These pics illustrate the result...

This is the easy bit - the stretcher bars assembled beautifully with very little effort.

I cut the fabric to allow for several inches of overlap




Here is how it looked after the first few staples

And here is the fully-stapled version...

And the front!

Confessions...

Ok, in case this all looks too easy, here are the confessions!

• The staple gun turned out to be huge - too big for my hands, and therefore needed two hands to do it
• The canvas itself was beautifully primed, which has the side effect of making it very stiff and not at all easy to stretch
• After a fruitless first attempt at pulling the canvas taut with pliers, while simultaneously trying to use the giant staplegun, I concluded that there was no way I could do this alone and got in some hired muscle to help.
• With one person pulling the canvas tight and another firing in the staples, it worked out pretty well. I suspect someone with larger hands or smaller equipment would manage it alone, but alternatively working with un-primed fabric would probably make the job easier.
  

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