Morning at Deadhorse Point

Morning at Deadhorse Point
Painting No. 10-J-12
6"x 8", oil on canvas panel

This was the second to last painting I did while in Moab, Utah for the Plein Air Moab 2012 event. Deadhorse Point is wildy beautiful, I heard some tourists commenting that they thought it was better than the Grand Canyon. I might agree, with panoramic views and shear vertical cliffs it's an eyeful for sure.
The interesting thing about painting here is that you cant go wrong with whatever you decide to paint. In fact, the only draw back is when an artist might try to capture the entire panoramic scene in one painting, it's just not practical. I painted this scene while thin clouds played games with the background shadows. It happened to be a "happy accident" that the monolith and canyon rim were in the sunlight and the background was in the shadows. It made for a highlighted main subject....almost always a good idea.  

Making Large Stretched Canvas

 

 

 

Making Large Stretched Canvas

Ok, Ok, it's easy to go to the craft store and buy stretched canvas. I do it every now and then myself. But it's much cooler and artistic to build your own stretched canvas panels. I started building my own last year. It doesn't take much for tools: a rubber mallet, canvas pliers, carpenter glue, tape measure, heavy-duty stapler.
I bought the stretcher bars in the photos from French Canvas, www.frenchcanvas.com real nice, well built bars as seen along the back wall. Buy a large quantity and you get a reduced price an it saves on shipping cost. The gesso primed canvas I buy locally.

Assemble the size stretcher bars you are desiring, the photos show 30" x 40". Apply a little glue at the corner joints.

Use the rubber mallet to tap the corners into place.
Use the tape measure to measure the diagonal distances, get them even.
Let sit overnight.
Next day cut an over sized piece of canvas and staple it to the middle outside of the longest stretcher bar. (now here's the tricky part). Next, using the canvas pliers; pull the canvas tight across from the first staple and insert a staple at the center of the canvas(one staple) then flip the canvas and staple the opposite side with 2 staples. The idea is to apply pressure side to side as you staple the canvas tight. Keep pulling the canvas tight as you work all four sides until the last 8 staples are at the 4 corners.  Fold the extra canvas at the corner and staple for a clean finish, trim extra canvas away.
After assembling 5-6 canvases; you'll be a pro.

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