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Types of canvas

 
 

Types of canvas

Three types, three treatments

Painters work with a variety of types of paint. Each type of paint requires a specific coating. There are three types of canvas. An oil canvas is intended solely for oil paint. Absorbent canvases are intended for tempera. Universal canvases are suitable for both oil paint and acrylic paint.
Each type of artist’s canvas is given a specific treatment after glueing.

Oil canvas

For an ‘oil canvas’, zinc white is used as the primer, bound with linseed oil. After that the canvas is put into a drying room for three days where it air-dries naturally. After that, we sand the canvas again and apply a coating layer based on titanium white. The canvas then has to go back into the drying room for a further ten days.

Absorbent canvases

‘Absorbent canvases’ are given two primer layers of chalk, bound with glue based on rabbit skins. Because this primer is water based, these canvases can be dried in the hot-air oven, where the water can evaporate more quickly.

Universal canvases

‘Universal canvases’ undergo the same drying process in a hot-air over as the absorbent canvases, but the two primer layers are titanium white based.

Reference numbers

Our reference numbers are prefixed with a number that specifies the treatment. If these canvases are untreated they carry the number 0 (e.g. 066), universal canvases carry the number 1 (e.g. 166) and absorbent
canvases the number 2 (e.g. 266). Oil canvases, in contrast, carry no prefix number (e.g. 66).

Traditional methods

Most of the treatments are done by machine, but according to traditional methods. For pieces that are wider than the standard size (210 cm), and for special types of artist’s canvas, we will go so far as to perform the entire process manually. The maximum length of manually prepared artist’s canvas is 40 metres.

Ready for use

When the canvas is completely dry, it is cut into 10-metre lengths, carefully rolled up, wrapped in damp-proof paper, packaged and dispatched to the customer. The story of the canvas has finished and the story of the painting can start.

See our full range of canvases.