Photos on Canvas
Canvas is the classic material of choice for painters, its usage dates back as far as the early fifteenth century, and was then spread by the success of the Renaissance artists and continues to the present day.
Of course, the precise nature of the material has evolved over the years, as have the methods of its preparation and the application of the paint, but the fundamental idea of stretching a heavy fabric between pieces of wood has remained unchanged for centuries due to its practicality and to the results that canvas makes it possible to achieve.
Strangely enough one of the few things that an abstract expressionist would have in common with his most illustrious figurative predecessors would be the surface on which he paints.
The latest development in the method of application to this surface, which would surely have amazed the Renaissance masters, is the printing of photographs to canvas. Photography itself of course has long surpassed the levels of realism that even the greatest of those early painters could have achieved but now it is possible for even the average person to render their own photos on to a canvas in a way that preserves the detail and colours while giving them the textured feel that one would expect from a personally commissioned painting.
Alternatively, with techniques available in modern photography, it is equally possible to create deliberately and strikingly unreal effects which can add a whole new twist to this ancient practice of displaying decorative art on canvas.
