Thursday, March 4, 2010

Construction Series



I 've finished the second in this series on the demolition in my house, and there still seems to be more percolating around in brain, so I have a third piece up on my design wall.  I'm running out of the background fabric so I may switch gears.  I also think I want to go bigger, in fact I ordered three 12 x 36 inch canvases from Dick Blick, and I'm thinking about making a tryptich.  I've never done this before where they are seemingly connected, so I'm thinking about either making one big piece and cutting it up, or cutting the fabric beforehand and making sure the pieces all flow together.


Terry at http://studio24-7.blogspot.com/ asked me to explain how I mount these on canvas.  I can't remember where I learned this, and I don't even know if it is the "correct" way of doing things, but it works for me. 



The first thing I do when I know I'm going to wrap a piece around canvas is try to stop stitching where the edge will be, as I want to avoid wrapping the felt batting I use around the edge.  This just makes it really bulky to work with and I can't get clean edges. When I have a piece with a straight edge on the front, that would look "off" if it didn't line up, I pin the piece on the side first to hold the straight line in place.


  This has been a problem for me in the past, as when I staple, I tend to pull it tight, and sometimes that throws the line out of whack. When I have one side lined up, I start by stapling the opposite side from the center, working to the edges.  I then go back to the pinned side and secure it down with staples.  After this, I finish off with the top and bottom.


For the edges, I do a fold into the corner,


Then a second fold to parallel the edge. 


This gets stapled down and to finish the piece off I staple a piece of fabric with the edges turned under to the back covering up my first staples.  I will usually sew the label to this before I attach it.  I then put in the same hanging method you would use for a picture.


3 comments:

Diana Parkes said...

Very good instructions Karen. And your piece is great too.

Dale Anne said...

THANK YOU Karen for the canvas tutorial...

Unknown said...

AMAZING WORK Karen!! You are truly talented and would love to see your artwork at your next show!