4.30 saturday evening
frustrated by confusing results with 2 square stones paintings, so decided to lay the foundations for 2 new big ones
red on one, orange on the other first
then blue on both
then dark green on orange one, light green on red one
getting to dark to see the colours properly
call it a day
donegallizdoyle 
Noticing your two ‘Stone’ paintings hung there adjacent to the woodburner Liz, I wondered if you ever found that proximate heat distorted stretchers at all?
they are never hanging close to a burning fire for long, because the fire is only lit for 2 or 3 hours a day and I move the paintings around. Definitely wouldnt be good to leave that close to a lit stove all day
I get a bit paranoid about hanging large canvases (in particular) adjacent to radiators – not above them, but even just to one side of a radiator.
maybe one should be a bit cautious with work that has not fully dried, or something particularly fragile, but I wouldnt think its a problem for most fully dried painted canvases, but then Im not a particularly fastidious sort of person! I think paintings are generally tougher than we think. However, please no one take my word for it if youre dealing with something rare and precious 🙂
Yes, it’s not the canvas and oil that I worry about, but the stretcher itself. I have had a few larger paintings which twisted out of square over the years such that they wouldn’t hang flat on a wall. As I don’t know how to re-stretch a canvas, I’ve resorted to having them mounted on 4mm. plywood (to bring them back into square) which then forms the back of an open box frame. They look great, but with the 10cm. borders and the 2cm. frame they become pretty huge!
oh, I see, I used to stretch my own canvases with a lovely coarse weave jute canvas, but I wasnt very good at getting them square and it was very hard work. Now I buy xl ready-stretched canvases, with at least 4cm deep bars and have never had a problem with these warping. However, most of my work is now on wooden cradled panels
painting with a fire blazing – looks like the life of the artist 🙂
yes, life of the artist is right! Fire in the studio, and 3 more stoves in the house – we need it here in wild windy Donegal. Thanks 🙂