Over the centuries, artists have juggled with many painting surfaces. Few surfaces have failed as they have led to higher color deviation and have ripped off the surface on being exposed to sunlight. Such mediums have been duly put into the trunk. Others have succeeded due to there larger acceptance for different mediums. They have sufficed the thirst of oil paintings and have also done the water color paintings proud. One such medium is canvas.



Canvas has spoken truly in times when wood, papyrus, vellum and many other surfaces have failed the uniformity test. Canvas paintings have allowed the artists the freedom to experiment. Many such experiments have involved multiple layering; a technique which could not meet mustard withy many other surfaces.

Both the bold and soft brushstrokes can be perfected on a canvas. The canvas represents the saga called oil paintings. Boiling a mixture of linseed and resin, a varnish is being prepared which is used for canvas paintings with oil. Canvas holds the pigment tight and allows for processing it for the dry oil mediums.

Oil paintings are multi layered. The under layers are generally done through turpentine oil. For years even paper and vellum have been tried but none has been able to soak the complexity that the oil medium is. Imagine how Vinci's Mona Lisa would have looked on paper. It would have come completely unstuck as the layers that emphasize the greatness of this painting would have been lost. This is where a canvas has beautifully graphed each contour of the face. The lip seems to hold a thousand riveting smiles and a subtle one too. How would any other surface have justified it?

In a nutshell: Oil on canvas can be magical. It is highly user-friendly and long lasting. Further the brushstrokes are neatly visible; each of them. Accentuated effect of canvas paintings is easily possible through oil medium.

Only water color painting uses paper as the more prolific surface. This is because it works on a water-centric medium and hence is close to papyrus.

What then is canvas? Well, it is a heavy ?duty fabric chiefly comprising of cotton. Its fundamental weave is ideally suited for paintings. A gesso coated canvas is extended on a wooden frame before it is utilized for paintings.

Few artists who are supple with the uses of colors uses linen canvas instead of cotton as the later extends more than linen. In fact canvases are not ideal to paint on in their natural coarseness; this is why they are often primer coated.

Renaissance artists have always looked to hide the texture through paints. Modern day artists do not look to camouflage the texture. On the contrary, they emphasize it just as they emphasize the paint.

Van Gogh's ?Starry Night? is a top of the line example of canvas painting so is Dali's Surrealistic masterpiece ?Persistence of Memory?. Picasso's ?Guernica? is still rooted as one of the best works on canvas. A little known Lisa Giardini has been submitted to history by a magician who excelled with canvas. Yes, we are talking of Leonardo Da Vinci.