I painted more ivy today, which brings the Aviator’s Dream dangerously close to completion. The crucifixion got a glaze coat over the blacks to make the quality of the finish more consistent, leaving only that face to deal with. So there are two major paintings nearly complete, meaning that I’d better get some more work prepared.
I have a couple of stretcher bars made up that needed stretching, so I pulled out the 82″ x 48″ and put some canvas on it, gessoed it and left it to dry. It’s the same size as Fama and the Aviator’s Dream, so I guess I’m looking at a trilogy there. Rich Brimer came to the studio on his motorcycle and took these pictures.
Stretching the canvas. T-50 stapler and 10mm staples. I truly prefer painting on well-gessoed canvas stretched over wood, but I want to use the resources I have here.
 Spreading the gesso.Â
The finished canvas, stretched and gessoed. I expect to add an additional six coats of gesso to take the tooth of the canvas out. What’s going on this one? I wonder what the adventure’s going to be this time.
