Transference

I have been pottering in my studio. Having cleared the bench, it seemed as though I should put it to good use.

Which I did, with these five canvases.

I used a simple transfer technique to get some of my images onto the canvas.

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My first attempt used a mono image. I coated a canvas thinly with Golden’s Fluid Matte Medium and applied a plain paper laser print to it, leaving it to dry while I read the instructions  which said to coat the canvas thickly. This may explain the poor adhesion evidenced here. No worries. The beauty of canvas is that a quick coat of gesso will hide any former sins and allow me to proceed again with a clean sheet… er, canvas. There is no waste.

Note to self: next time read the instructions before charging in like a bull at a gate.

The second example was more thickly coated and I used Golden’s Regular Gel (Matte) this time, with obviously greater success.

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These first two examples are fully dry. They have  a dusty appearance and could probably bear more work on removing the paper. They are delicate though and I may rely on a coat of Mod Podge to beautify the finish as well as to seal it.

Today I rubbed the paper from three more canvases that I transferred last night. I made an error in coating the canvases and leaving them to dry. It was a “senior moment”, I think. As a consequence, I had to apply a second  thin coat of the Regular Gel – and this seems to have paid off with a much better transfer.

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These three are still damp, so the colours appear very dark still. Like the earlier ones, more work on rubbing the paper backing off would give an improved appearance. It seems to work best for me if I allow them to dry, then spray and soak again before further rubbing.

They look great with a light source behind them.

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Five 5″ square canvases cost me £10.99, with free p&p. The mediums push the cost up somewhat but I have it on good authority that this technique can be worked with ordinary emulsion paint and that is minimal cost per canvas. So, original art for the home for about £3 a throw. I’ll be sticking to the mediums for now but will certainly try emulsion paint at some point.

Time is another issue, so I am thinking of pricing at about £8 for craft fair type venues, once I have my technique polished. Does that seem fair?

Tell you what, the WP team are encouraging bloggers to use forms… here’s one:

With material costs at around £3.50 per five inch canvas, transferred by hand from original photographic images, at what price do you think these might be sold?(required)

 

For the record, I chose images for experimentation quite randomly. I shall be choosing a set of images for production work later. I did not reverse print any of these images as  I was basically concerned with getting the technique down. I shall probably gesso over all of these and have another go.

I have some 8″ square canvases ordered.

The conservatory is tidied out and ready to attack with the Dyson tomorrow. Puzzle week begins at 3am. It takes strength of character to stick with the cleaning and to leave the fun stuff until after 5pm. However, if I do not achieve that, nothing will be ready in time for showing our face to the public. There is a mountain of work waiting to be done.

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