Sizing the cotton canvas with an acrylic polymer or medium that is allowed to soak through or is forced into the canvas fibers creates a composite of cotton threads and acrylic binder that dramatically reduces the overall stretch of the support, making it much more rugged, stiff and capable of reducing a great deal of the floppiness of the stretched canvas.
Artist Canvas Fabric
We have a superb collection of canvas fabric for painting here at Pegasus Art. We have made sure to bring together an array of all the very best artist canvas fabric because we know how important a feature it is of anyone’s artwork. Although it may well be the piece of the artwork which the viewer, by the end, cannot see, it is crucial for any artist to choose the right canvas. Certain aspects – such as material type and weight – should factor into your decision. We have some primed and unprimed options for you to consider.
Primed canvases have a great appeal because one of the early jobs is taken care of, meaning that you can get on with the painting. With primed canvas, the surface will have already had a primer applied. There are primed canvas options here in our collection made of synthetic fabric or cotton. You can also buy in bulk; there is an option to get a 10 metre roll should you wish to stock up on some high quality primed canvas or be making your own custom canvases.
Unprimed Canvas
You could, however, also go for an unprimed canvas, meaning that you would need to add your own primer to the canvas before you start painting. Many choose unprimed canvases, as they prefer to prepare the canvas themselves with their own choice of primer. If you are one of those people, then do make sure to have a look through the excellent examples of unprimed canvas here. You will be able to pick up unprimed canvas of different weights, materials and sizes.
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RRP: £393.15
£370.00
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25 Metre Roll 12oz Canvas – 100% Cotton Duck Unprimed Unprimed canvas 183cms Width (72 inches) Artist Canvas : 12oz cotton canvas fabric is the classic painting canvas. The cotton canvas has a smooth, dense construction and is suitable for large scale as well as small scale art works. This Cotton Duck Canvas is the bestseller at Pegasus Art.The canvas fabric surface has a medium smooth grain. The…
RRP: £621.00
£580.00
1 in stock
25 Metre Roll 12oz Canvas – 100% Cotton Duck Unprimed 274cms Width Artist Canvas : 12oz cotton canvas fabric is the classic painting canvas. The cotton canvas has a smooth, dense construction and is suitable for large scale as well as small scale art works. This Cotton Duck Canvas is the bestseller at Pegasus Art.The canvas fabric surface has a medium smooth grain. The name “duck” comes from the D…
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£339.12
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9oz Cotton Canvas Roll 25 Metres 274cm width (108″) The 9oz canvas has a strong, half panama construction and is one of our most popular canvases. It is available in 274cms(108 inches) wide.The 9oz cotton duck canvas is woven with denser, finer yarn for greater strength with a smooth texture. The fabric feels thinner than the heavyweight 12oz which is the canvas we recommend for the largest canva…
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RRP: £290.00
£267.00
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Claessens Synthetic Canvas No 101 – 10 metre roll Very Fine Smooth Polyester Acrylic Primed Claessens Synthetic Fabric Canvas 101. The quality of Claessens fabric has been known to discerning artists for many years. This No 101 canvas, a mixture of polyester and viscose, has an extra smooth surface. The universal primer, titanium white based, on this makes it suitable for acrylic paint, mixed medi…
RRP: £29.00
£26.70
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Acrylic Primed Claessens Synthetic Fabric Canvas 101. The quality of Claessens fabric has been known to discerning artists for many years. This No 101 canvas, a mixture of polyester and viscose, has an extra smooth surface. The universal primer, titanium white based, on this makes it suitable for acrylic paint, mixed media and oil paint. 101 Claessens Primed Synethetic rolls are 210cms/83ins wide…
£15.75
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Artist Canvas : 12oz cotton canvas fabric is the classic painting canvas. The cotton canvas has a smooth, dense construction and is suitable for large scale as well as small scale art works. The name �duck� comes from the Dutch word �doek,� meaning linen cloth. Linen duck is still available, primarily for use in artists canvases, but cotton is now the most common material for duck cloth. Duck canv…
£24.85
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Artist Canvas : 12oz cotton canvas fabric is the classic painting canvas. The cotton canvas has a smooth, dense construction and is suitable for large scale as well as small scale art works. This Cotton Duck Canvas is the bestseller at Pegasus Art.The canvas fabric surface has a medium smooth grain. The name �duck� comes from the Dutch word �doek,� meaning linen cloth. Linen duck is still availabl…
£13.60
In stock
9oz Cotton Canvas has a strong, half panama construction and is one of our most popular canvases. It is available in 274cms(108 inches) wide.The 9oz cotton duck canvas is woven with denser, finer yarn for greater strength with a smooth texture. The fabric feels thinner than the heavyweight 12oz which is the canvas we recommend for the largest canvas frame sizes. 274cms/108ins wide. Choice of 1/2…
RRP: £29.50
£27.50
In stock
Primed Cotton Canvas 10oz Medium Weight 150cm – 61″ Width This 10oz weight cotton canvas has been triple primed with acrylic primer. The rolls are 150cms/61ins wide. Price Per Metre inclusive of VAT. 10oz Primed Cotton Canvas Canvas will be shipped on a roll to protect surface from creasing.
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© Pegasus Art – 2023
Construction of the Cotton Fiber
The cotton fiber is made up of over 90% cellulose (and hemicellulose), water, pectins, wax, glucose and mineral salts (potassium malate). The quality and strength of the cotton fiber come from the large cellulose polymer made with upwards of 6,000 repeating glucose molecules. The natural cotton fiber is the purest made up of cellulose.
Cotton fibers are made up of areas constructed of well-ordered crystalline segments and less ordered segments or amorphous areas. The crystalline regions are tightly packed, reducing the penetration of water and other chemicals making the fibers stronger and more resistant to chemical and biological attack. The amorphous areas allow for flexibility of the fiber, but are more prone to chemical and biological degradation as well as greater absorption of water. The greater the ratio of amorphous regions of a fiber compared to its crystalline regions, the more easily the fiber is degraded. Cotton fibers contain approximately 70% crystalline regions versus linen which has up to 90% crystalline makeup of its fiber.
Cotton can be degraded by several forces including photochemical (UV and visible light), chemical attack, mechanical stress and biological attack. Effects of light will increase with increasing moisture and other photo-reactive materials in the cotton. The degradation caused by light in combination with other environmental factors produces a loss of tensile strength, increased yellowing and loss of elongation percentage, creating a more brittle textile. For artists, most canvas is protected from significant UV damage by the filtering of window glass. Damage to cotton canvas is more often the result of chemical attack from acids, enzymes from mold and mildew and most importantly, the effects of mechanical stress. Weakened canvas is more easily degraded as the damaged sites create greater permeability and are more easily degraded by these enzymes.
Cotton is highly degraded by acids or acid salts. The large cellulose polymer is broken apart and is oxidized to oxycellulose. It has long been a practice for artists to protect the cotton fabric before painting with oils with a sizing to prevent the acids in the oil and the drying catalysts from reaching the fiber surfaces. The alkaline chemistry is much less destructive to the cellulose molecule and requires much higher concentration than that found in the acrylic medium.
One of the most common destructive processes affecting cotton comes from mold and mildew growing on fabric exposed to high levels of moisture or humidity or from paintings exposed to flooding. The enzymes produced by these organisms break down the cellulose and more easily reproduce in highly moist conditions. They preferentially attack starches, potentially added to fibers either in the weaving or finishing processes. All of these conditions affecting the cotton fiber are exacerbated when the fibers are under the stresses of the woven and stretched cloth. We’ll cover the effects of mechanical stress later in this paper.
Cotton is capable of absorbing up to 25 times its weight in water. This water-loving (hydrophilic) nature is based on the strong attraction of the OH portion of the cellulose and especially the hemicellulose polymer to the water molecule. This is also the reason that unrestrained cotton fabric, when wet, will shrink dramatically as the fibers swell. Cotton canvas which is under strain, stretched, reacts slightly different. In this case the fibers also swell, but water also lubricates the fibers (in the amorphous region) allowing them to slip past one another thereby reducing some of the stress and first loosening the fabric, before dramatically retightening.
Weaving the Cotton Canvas
The weaving process for textiles requires first, a setting of lengthwise yarns that are held in tension by a loom. The word for these fibers, warp, is derived from the old English word weorpan (or Dutch werpen), meaning ‘that which is thrown across like a net’. The fill yarn that is actually woven in and out of the warp fibers is called the weave or weft (old English ‘wefen’ meaning to weave). To achieve the speed necessary in the weaving process, the use of a size, specifically in single plied yarn, is required. The size is simply a coating of material that when dry, increases the fibers’ strength and binds the surface of the fiber to reduce fraying and friction during weaving. The process of applying size to the surface of the cotton fibers is called ‘cotton slashing’. It was typical of traditional weaving processes to apply a starch to the warp fibers, which stiffens the fiber, making it less flexible. The weft fiber is not sized as it had the potential of making the fiber too brittle. The size composition for cotton typically contains corn starch, but may also be blended with other starches, including potato, wheat, rice, sago (from a variety of palm tree) or tapioca. The starches are heated with water to reduce their viscosity and make them more active. Additionally, softeners need to be added to this size to increase the pliability of the yarn and allow it a bit more lubricity for the weaving. Normal sizing is done to improve the properties of the weave. At the end of the slashing process, the fibers are dried. After the weaving, the size is typically removed. Raw cotton canvas contains significant quantities of impurities, many of which have been shown to be responsible for Support Induced Discoloration (SID) which causes significant yellowing of waterborne polymers when applied in thick layers to these fabrics. (See A Remarkable Way to Stretch Canvases (Just Paint #17) & Defining the Acrylic Patina (Just Paint #23)
It is becoming more common for artists to use single filled (single ply) cotton for their work. The heavier single filled canvases weighing over 10 oz. will often contain a double plied yarn in the warp with a single ply weft or fill yarn. Canvas 7 oz. or less will most often be single ply for both warp and weft. Cotton numbered duck for artists contains plied fibers in both the warp and weave, meaning two or more yarns twisted together to form a stronger, thicker plied yarn.
Cotton canvas or numbered duck is usually woven in a plain weave; one yarn under and over each yarn of the warp and weft. There are examples of artists’ canvas being woven in drill or twill pattern, meaning two or three fibers in the warp over two or three fibers in the weft. The warp threads are held at tension yet the fill or weaving threads run much straighter, making the warp yarns much more crimped than the weft yarns.
Multiple ply cotton duck is measured by weight per square yard of material. These weights are commonly referred to as number ducks to differentiate them from other cotton canvas or single filled canvas.
The lower number ducks increase in weight by increasing the number of plied fibers, as well as increasing the weight (or thickness) of the yarn, therefore containing more cotton per yard. A #8 duck contains 3 ply warp and 3 ply weft fibers. It is the thickest of typical artists’ canvases, making it a bit more difficult to stretch. It is commonly used for floor cloths and has a very pronounced texture. The #12 cotton duck is the most common numbered duck for artists’ use and consists of two ply yarns in both directions. A #10 cotton duck, a coarser canvas using thicker plied yarns is also a common artist canvas and is often used for larger canvases above 4 feet. It is simply a much sturdier fabric. The yarns in number duck run between 7 count (coarse) to 11 count¹. It is very common that some inexpensive canvases use fabric that is as light as 5 oz. per square yd. using a 16 count yarn and thinner. When the prepared canvas is already filled with a priming coat of a synthetic gesso it feels much more substantial. Some manufacturers of prepared canvas provide the weight of the canvas including the size and/or ground, making it difficult to know the actual weight of the raw cotton fabric. As the cotton canvas gets lighter, it tends to be a more open weave and is usually made with single filled (or non-plied yarns called single ply). Thinner fabrics may be less stable over time especially when tightened over a stretcher, given the stresses on the material to keep it taut and in-plane. The lighter canvas does have a less pronounced weave, which may be attractive to some artists. It is often sold as ‘portrait canvas’.
The tear strength and tensile strength of the numbered cotton duck is typically stronger than a similar weight single filled duck of the same quality fibers. It is possible to gain significantly greater strength of the fabric by using better quality cotton fibers and a thicker yarn in both the single and double filled canvas. In single filled cotton duck, the weight gets lighter as the yarn width gets thinner, yet it is also typical that the yarn count will increase slightly to maintain the structure. Both the tensile strength and the tear strength are greater in the warp yarns than the fill yarns. Not only are the warp and weft fibers potentially different in their width and number of plied yarns, but they will also differ in the number of twists of the yarn, with the warp usually having more twists, reducing the number of hairs protruding from the threads. It is therefore easy to understand that the fabric will have different properties of stretch and strain in the warp and weft.
The final cotton fabric is graded according to several factors; its lightness of color, the amount of trash (plant material not cleaned in the ginning or spinning process), the number of broken yarns, misweaves, oil staining, other colored yarns, slubs or neps (bumps in the canvas often caused by immature fibers, or smaller fibers getting through the yarn making process) or broken yarns. The grades of woven cotton fabrics range from AB for the poorest goods with the most amount of defects and the weakest strength to A++ grades with the fewest amount of defects and strongest goods. Cotton canvas for artists is typically A grade goods with some at the lowest AB grades. It is therefore important for artists using unprimed cotton duck to check the fabric, especially if a very smooth, continuous surface is desired. If the canvas is pre-primed it’s more difficult to recognize flaws, but most quality manufacturers of pre-primed canvas have inspected their goods for missing weave and slubs, which will show up on visual inspection of the canvas even with pre-priming.
Stretching Cotton Canvas
Most artists using unprimed cotton canvas will do their priming after the canvas is stretched. Whether sizing with acrylic primers, rabbit skin glues or PVA size or going directly to acrylic gesso (acrylic dispersion grounds), these materials all contain water. Water will dramatically swell the cotton threads, causing the total length of the fibers to shorten, and therefore increase the tension of the stretched fabric. In some cases, the tension created can splinter or warp the wood stretchers. Even if the stretchers are able to withstand the forces created, the differential in stretching will show itself in the variability of the tension next to the staples in a scalloped patterning. In James Bernstein’s technical paper in Just Paint 17, he shares the benefits of pre-stretching your canvas before final attachment to your support. By sizing (pre-wetting) and pre-stretching, the cotton is both allowed to come to a greater equilibrium as well as cementing or locking the fibers into a more protected composite material. Also demonstrated in the Just Paint 17 article“A Remarkable Way to Stretch Canvases” is Bernstein’s technique for stretching the perfect canvas, creating an even tension across the entire surface of a canvas.
For a description of the differences between stretchers and strainers, see the Just Paint article, “Stretchers and Strainers: Secrets of the Trade“ by David Headley, and “A Remarkable Way to Stretch Canvases“ by James Bernstein.
