Tear Mending

Canvas is a widely used support for painting, and while relatively strong and durable, it can present some issues – mainly tears and deformations, but sometimes holes. Tearing has a significant impact on the overall aspect of a painting. Sometimes simple gluing of ends of the linen threads together at the back of the canvas and drying under pressure yields a good result. Tear mending often includes the making of incrustations from linen canvas to fill the large holes. On to the addition a layer of filling applied and later retouched and varnished. 

In some cases thread-by-thread technique is applied. In this case, an adhesive based on a high percentage sturgeon glue and starch is used to glue one end of the thread to the appropriate thread across the tear. This is done under a microscope. This technique re-enforces the lost tension of the canvas and provides the most invisible restoration, even hard to see from the back of the canvas.