Last week was an annoying week. I hit one of those dry spells and wasn’t feeling it with anything I was producing. I made some large drawings of the fallen box, but I found it hard to get into the work making process all week, so I felt frutrated all week and into the weekend. Looking back now though, I quite these large drawings, so i’ll continue to make them.
On Friday, it was suggested that I try using this window film, the kind you use to insulate windows and make them like doub;e glazing, I didn’t know such a thing existed, thanks Laura. I found out that Homebase sold such a thing, and bought some. It comes as quite a large sheet, about 5ft x 8ft. I tested some out on an old stretcher and used the ‘special tape’ that came with it and then used a hairdryer, and as the instructions described ‘magic’ happened (it tightened up nice and strong). It looks good, totally transparent, and tough enough to work on. I got stuck right in with some oil paints and pigments, and scratched into the surface with sandpaper. The surface did go wrinkly, but the hairdrier sorted it out. I’ll be trying out some acrylics on this surface today, and working on 2 layers again, in black and white.
So, so far I’ve experimented with the following: Voile – translucent and nice to work with, nice substitute for canvas. Polythene sheet – translucent but not as seethrough as I’d hoped, stretches well, but you can’t get the folds out. Cellothane – transparent, doesn’t like being stretched, nice for a using on it’s own though, it will tear really easily. Window film – transparent, stretches really well, suprisingly tough, tightens with heat. So I’ve found my new material. Maybe.
