Newsprint to Canvas

[Mary Case GCF]

No, not a new Period Drama by the BBC. Need a little help. I have a customer. Lovely lady who doesn't mind spending money with me but rather eccentric. Every job she brings me is a challenge. Among the armfuls she brought today were 4 drawings on newsprint. She doesn't want them behind glass and she wants them to stay "organic".I know that won't protect the art, but she has very definite ideas about how she wants her art framed.I had a bright idea which was out of my mouth before | could stop it. I suggested attaching the newsprint to an open weave canvas I foolishly bought in my "I'm going to offer canvas bonding"period of 10 years ago, after stretching the canvas over bars. Only problem is I have no idea how to attach the paper without damaging it. It is very flimsy as newsprint is and already suffering a little damage. Any ideas?

[Dermot]

Perhaps you could get it scanned and bond the photo/reproduction to the canvas…. (this is what Hugh Phibbs would suggest)

I did something like that one time with a watercolour that the customer wanted to give to his sisters and brothers……..it really looked more or less like the real thing when it was finished..

A commercial photographic lab should be able to scan and reproduce it.

[Roboframer]

I was going to say what Dermot did - honest!

Every time a customer wants pretty much anything bar an oil, or a tile or ....... suchlike with no glass, especially something on paper, I ask them 'Why?'

The answer is invariably the glare/reflection - so I show them museum glass (Clearcolor + UV actually) and ask them to talk their way out of that one!

OK it's an arm and a leg, well, at least the arm, but would it be any more than canvas bonding, laminating and stretching?

Regards the oils even - I'm selling more and more of those behind museum glass these days, stretched over battens or on board. I just ask the question, 'Which would you rather clean - an oil (etc) or a piece of glass?"

Oh and "are you qualified to clean the oil"? IOW - you'd have to pay to have it cleaned, probably.

[Mary Case GCF]

Decided to take the coward's way out and advise the customer it wasn't a good idea to do the canvas thing. A reproduction would have been no good any way. It was the original she wanted to frame. Anyway, we're putting the drawings behind mounts, held to the barrier board with mylar mounting strips and behind glass. She accepted the other way would be no good for the paper. Coming in tomorrow to choose the frame. She wanted an invisible frame, but not a clip frame. How about a clear acrylic frame, with the mitres joined with superglue? Why hasn't that been invented yet?. Answers on a postcard please.......

[Dermot]

Use an acrylic box display frame

[Dermot]

Dream keepers are listed in the suppliers directory http://www.dreamkeepers.co.uk

https://scenes.biz/framersdirectory/index.php?m ... mfromid=14

They should be able to make you up a nice display case...

[Mary Case GCF]

Thanks anyway, but that wouldn't work either. I was thinking (foolishly) about a normal moulding shape, but made of acrylic. A little too much ( or too little) wine drunk this evening.

[Dermot]

The other thing you could think about is encapsulating it and float mounting it in some manner….between two sheets of acrylic...

Below is a bit of information that may help…

http://www.thegrumble.com/showthread.php?t=4042

http://www.pictureframingmagazine.com/p ... lyeste.pdf

[Mary Case GCF]

Yeah, that was mentioned once before on another thread. Still not right for this piece. Customer happy with what I'm going to do. She trusts me. Not like a new customer who came in yesterday. Wouldn't leave the full cost of her work because "she didn't trust us"! I should have told her if that was the case she should take her work to a framer she could trust. I didn't. I chickened out and took a deposit.

[Not your average framer]

Hi Mary,

I think that the easy way out of this one is to dry mount it on to Artcare Restore, but only if the media she has used can withstand dry mounting. In theory Artcare Restore is supposed to be fully reversible and hopefully she will never ask you to reverse the dry mounting.

I think I would want something signed by her before doing it, in case she does changes her mind at a later date and there are problems.

How come so many customers think we can do miracles?

[Framer Dave]

Probably too late...

So what you wanted to do was to stretch canvas on bars, just like a painting, and then mount the artwork to that? Assuming that's the case: Build a set of stretcher bars, and then cut a piece of mount board exactly the outside dimensions of the bars. Attach that the the bars, then stretch the fabric over it. So now, it appears to be an ordinary stretched canvas, just with a board hidden behind the fabric.

Then hinge the artwork, pass the hinges through slits cut through the fabric and board, and attach to the back to create a S-hinge.

Of course this is all a moot point, as the job has already been done or turned away, and preservation goes out the window without proper glazing.

[Mary Case GCF]

Thanks everybody for suggestions. Might use some of them or elements of them in the future. In the end we used the canvas to wrap a 4 cm flat profiled moulding, Artcare Restored the squiggles on newsprint and put them behind glass with spacers. The customer was delighted. We delivered all her paintings, were given a glass of wine and 2 more pictures to take back with us to reframe. Result!