How to Make a Painting - Studio progress September 2025

For the final September seminar, I wanted to try out a large piece as per the recommendations from my supervisors and the external assessor in my July report. I purchased a 5m long roll of 12oz unprimed canvas, and noting that the dye or ink was not easily absorbed unless is was soaking wet, I put the canvas in the pool and then spread it out on the lawn. The canvas was taking on mud and other garden detritus which I thought was interesting as part of the process. The canvas when it was wet also revealed some horizontal stripes when wet which was obviously part of the mechanised weave process, and invisible before. The dye soaked in and then I used the garden hose to spray most of it away to leave a less intense colour. I then dried out the canvas and while it was drying, made a series of marks into areas of the dye with brush handles, sticks, a garden rake and a screwdriver. I added a few sprinkles of the powdered natural dyes and mixed them with water. After the canvas was dry, I spray painted areas of a new crocheted tablecloth that had arrived in the post. It had a very large open pattern so was ideal for using as a template. I layered the tablecloth, and trying not to be too specific in placing it straight. I wanted it to appear loosely hanging over each other.

With Helene Cixous’s white ink in my mind, I tried out using bleach to write into the dye on the stretched canvases. It was like using invisible ink and the I had to wait for the reveal. It was quite subtle which I really liked. I tried it neat and diluted with water to introduce a variety of white tones. The bleach took out the dye colour but not the spray paint colour (obviously due to the polymer content in spray paint).

The first large 5m came out a bit dark I decided, so I brought another roll, this time 4m and tried the process again. This time the weather meant that I couldn’t really work outside so I occupied the garage and wet the canvas by hand. I used some powdered colour pigment and mixed with acrylic medium before working marks into the colour. Then I used transparent gesso to dull down the colour a little. The marks didn’t really make their way through to the other side of the canvas that much, so I decided to work on the front face this time. I spray painted the tablecloth, but learnt a valuable lesson, as in my haste, the canvas was still a bit wet and the spray paint blurred slightly. The loss of definition made it look a little grubby overall. When I make the next one for the November exhibition, I must let each stage dry to achieve the best results.