How to Carry Wet Paintings: A $5.49 DIY panel carrier

Here is a quick and cheap idea for a panel carrier. 

Plein air painting requires a lot of equipment for just the basics, easel, tripod, an umbrella depending on sun and weather, a medium like pastels, oil or watercolor, and their surfaces to paint on, paper or canvas and linen panels (and all the other options), and brushes. If you are a plein air artist, you know there's more too... rags or paper towels, view finder, mall stick, tools, water, and so on. This post is focused narrowly - for oil painters to suggest a cheap, simple way to transport in a dry panel and to transport out a wet one. 

The premise is simple: Create a light, cheap device that holds two panels of the same size 9x12", 12x16", whatever, to protect them from being dirtied or scratched, and to protect the artist or the artist's belongings from getting more paint on them. (Who among us hasn't found unplanned paint on a light switch, car door handle, and a favorite shirt?) I've described a simple solution below. 

You will need 2 frames, glue and a rubber band. I had the glue and rubber band on hand. 

Yesterday, I decided to paint plein air on a 5X7" canvas panel but didn't have a carrier for it. Typically, I use an 8x10" 9x12" or 11x14" for painting outdoors. For those I have beautiful panel carriers made by a carpenter-friend. To buy them online, the cost is around $20 plus shipping, but mine are works of art themselves, made from scraps of specialty wood. 

To get by yesterday, I took a C-clamp and wax paper, and counted on the idea that once in the car, it would get minimal jostling. The wax paper would keep debris and dust from landing on it and the clamp provides a handle. Anyway, I figured I could fix any smudging.  But then, in Chicago, there are wide and fast corners...

On the way home from the paint out, the wet painting slid around in the trunk of my car. It really didn't hurt anything, but I can't depend on my luck holding. Turns out, I liked the idea of painting small. I painted looser, faster and worked out the values. If I had a bit more time, I could have completed a second painting.  So, I stopped at Michaels and found a package of two wood frames for $10. Immediately, I saw the potential and found a 50% discount coupon on line that to use at the cashier. This project cost $5.49, with sales tax, sans the glue and rubber band. 

At home I removed the cellophane from the frames and removed the glass and paper.  

Using my trusty glue gun, I smeared glue on the front sides of both frames and placed them together. Later, I laid another bead of glue around the edges as an even seal. Someone asked, why do you need glue, not simply the rubber band to hold them together. Because, you don't want them to slide. If you don't have a glue gun, use Elmers, chunks of double sided tape or Velcro, though none of those sound as easy to me.

I was able to place my wet panel from earlier in the day facing the center. I could add a second one on the other side, also facing the center, because the depth of the frames will keep them separated. 

While I used the clips that were included in the frame, I am sure with use they will break off. I added a rubber band for extra security.  Next time I go out, I will insert a blank canvas surface on each side and complete one or two as time and energy allow. Or, if you only have on canvas of the size, you could keep and use, the backing that has the hangers on it.... come to think of it, you end up with a nice frame for showing it at a critique or until you use your carrier again. 

                                      

This idea is not my own. I copied it from the very talented, clever and thrifty Wisconsin artist, Dana M. Johnson, who painted plein air with the Plein Air Painters Chicago a couple summers back. As I remember the story, she and her dad created from frames found at a thrift store. I've looked there and garage sales, but never found two identical frames that would work. With the coupon, the price is about as good as it gets and a quarter of what you'd pay for a manufactured panel carrier. Michaels has many sizes of these packages of frames. There's no reason you couldn't make one for each size you use.  

For more on traveling and transporting plein air equipment, check out this post: How to Pack for Plein Air Painting Travel.

How to Pack for Plein Air Painting Travel that includes Flying

TSA at O’Hare found and tossed a small pocketknife engraved with my name, that I’d sadly “lost” nearly a year prior.  A discerning agent uncovered it from deep in the folds of my carry-on where it apparently had been traveling with me for at least five trips. The agent offered to let me leave security, send it to myself and come back through the line; I chose to make my flight instead. Since 2014, I’ve traveled to Cuba, Spain, Mexico, and several places within the USA with both oil and watercolor plein air gear and have had no other incident. Below, I’m passing along learnings from workshop leaders, other artists, and experience. You'll find a few links to sites that might be helpful too, and at the very end, links to other related articles.   

Avoid Confiscation: Some plein air equipment can be construed as weapons. Brushes, palette knives, tripod, umbrella, or a mall stick may strike the diabolical fancy of a security person, and, be removed from luggage. I’m not willing to risk the confiscation for two reasons: cost and whether replacement is possible. The art store in Havana in January 2018 offered for sale, no hyperbole here, one tube of black acrylic paint, some markers and a few books. In Spain, in a seaside town, I could only find Cotman watercolors, and only in a whole travel set, not individual tubes or pans. In Guanajuato, Mexico in 2017, there were two places to buy art supplies, though a meager selection at both. The owner of the one near the Diego Rivera museum is an artist, and at least understood my interests.  Bottom-line... pack as if your painting depended on it. 

Packing for an air-travel plein air adventure isn’t really so different than packing for a day’s paint out. What self-preserving plein air painter doesn’t already think about weight, size and safety? Packing for a painting trip boils down to space, weight, getting supplies through security and making sure you have the right clothes for the time you’re not painting. So first thing, know that checking a bag is the easiest route to take. I know, what frequent traveler wants to check and lug bags? As Nike says, just do it!

I pack for 5 – 21 days in a hard sided, 24” Samsonite bag I found at TJ Max, and a backpack with wheels I found online. I carry a small “clutch” so I have a purse on the ground and I have with me a tiny foldable cloth bag, in the event I shop during the trip. While traveling, my backpack contains TSA approved items including my 8"x10" Open Box M easel, clutch/wallet, iPad, and anything essential I would need if my bags didn’t arrive with me. Sometimes, an extra pair of shoes or overflow clothes end up in my backpack too. Once I get to the hotel, the contents of the backpack will be switched out for my art equipment and supplies. The selection criteria for the backpack included - large enough to hold all that, outside pockets on both sides, a water bottle and other stash, straps on both sides around the pockets, and, multiple pockets with separate sections. 

How much to pack? Just because you’re checking a bag, don’t fall into allowing yourself to pack as much as the airlines allows, (typically 40 or 50 pounds.) It’s just too cumbersome to handle. Remember too, if you are staying in an Air B&B, a small hotel or, if you arrive in say, Madrid, in the middle of a marathon and the marathon doesn’t allow a cab to cross a major intersection, or you arrive in New York, the day after the Trump election and a cab can’t get across Fifth Avenue because of angry marchers, you’re destined to do your own schlepping… for blocks, over cobblestones or up flights of stairs. Pack as luggable as possible. By the way, I have packed in larger bags, but it was the hour walk in Madrid, where I felt like I had completed an ultra marathon  that cured me of that.

How to pack? My 20” carry-on bag, which I use for as many as three days and holding mainly paint and casual clothes, opens to one compartment. My hard sided bag that I use for longer trips opens up with top and bottom compartments. I pack all clothes and my cosmetic kit on one side, shoes and art equipment on the other. I LOVE packing my clothes in travel cubes. I’ve tried a couple different brands and found the Eagle Creek compression sacks that have a double zipper are the best for me. The first zipper encloses the items; the second compresses them to take much less space. I have enough now to have discreet bags for undies, t-shirts and tops, pants, socks, sweaters, and miscellaneous one-ofs, like bathing suit, scarves. It’s so much easier to get dressed (especially, if you don’t want to wake a roommate) and keep things minimized and organized.

Packing to avoid confiscation: With the objective to minimize TSA’s likelihood of removing my supplies, I place my equipment in the main, “bottom” side of my two-sided bag. Once entirely packed, I place a printed note to inspectors on top of that side, held in by the bag’s elastic strap. I believe the original note was developed for Plein Air Magazine’s convention attendees. Here are words for it. I recommend that you make it fit a half page of paper, make it look official, and make several copies of it to place with your paints and (non) solvents.

Attention Airline Inspectors

The contents in this bag are professional artist materials. It contains vegetable based oil paints and wet paintings. Take care while inspecting to protect from getting paint on clothing. All of these materials have a flashpoint above 550*. They are not hazardous and not flammable. There are no solvents in this bag. Please do not discard paints, as they are expensive. 

If you need to reach me to confirm, please contact me:

Name:                                                 email:                                                  Phone/Text:

The note contains the word, “flashpoint”. That’s the temperature at which they ignite more easily and are therefore, hazardous. Low flashpoints mean that the liquids are most flammable. You want to make sure any item you are packing is below that flashpoint. Paint manufactures like Winsor Newton and Gamblin understand this and have individual safety sheets for their products listing the nature of any hazard. Go to the manufactures site download and print the health and safety sheets and place them in your bag. It’s as simple as googling “Gamblin Safety” and you’ll find a link immediately. If you usually use an essential oil instead of a solvent, Google that flashpoint. Many are below 300^0[1], and flammable, so plan to buy them when you arrive at your destination.

Paints: Place your paints together in one or more clear plastic bags. I use zippered bags that came with pillowcases, or, you can buy a zippered cosmetic bag, or use a large zip-lock. (I sometimes use those that come with dried fruit, because they are durable and narrow.) With a Sharpie I write, “Artist Colors”, (not oil paints) in big letters directly on what I call the front of the bag, making sure paint tubes can be seen plainly. Behind the paint, I place the folded safety sheets and turn them so the wording is on the outside. I envision someone picking up the bag and inspecting it, seeing nothing untoward and, repacking it nicely. By the way, I pack my paints in one direction and place them where they are most likely to be pointed downward to keep them from separating.

(non) Solvents: Recently, when eight of us flew to Havana to paint, all 4, 6 and 32 ounce bottles of Gamsol, were still in our bags when we arrived. Though we packed various sizes, it turns out, we all packed the safety sheets with the liquids. Again, I used the same heavy clear plastic bag for the liquids, I wrote Artist Materials on the bag and enclosed the safety sheets.  Remember to empty your brush washer before you go and stuff it with a rags or other supplies for transit. The TSA is very clear, no turpentine or paint thinners. 

Oil Panels: For eight days in Cuba, I decided I would likely paint six of the days, two a day. (I didn’t, but that was my reasoning.) I took six each of two sizes of panels (8x10” and 9x12”.). I took one 2-sided wood panel carrier for each size and packed wax paper for others. Next trip I’ll also take 11x14” panels and carrier as well.

Each painting session I painted one size and switched to the other for the next. Those paintings started early in the trip were dry to the touch by the time we left. So, I placed wax paper around them, taped a nickel to the wax paper, in the four corners between 2 facing each other and used large rubber bands I found at an office store, to hold them together.  I took this idea from a demo last summer by pastelist, Nancie King Mertz.

Panel carriers that hold more panels are commercially available. I tried a cardboard style early on, but it collapsed. StephanieWiedner, a member of Plein Air Painter Chicago has hacked other clever panel carriers by notching wine corks and placing them at each corner and securing them with rubber bands. Dana Johnson an artist in Wisconsin bought 2 flat-faced frames at the Dollar Store, glued them together facing each other. Voila’ a panel carrier for two paintings. She too used rubber bands to hold in the wet panels. By the way, I use my easel to hold panels during transit.

Watercolor painting: I use a piece of 14”x20” foam core, lightly scored and folded in half as my board for painting and as a file for holding pieces of paper. (I cut my board down a bit to fit in my backpack so corners won’t be smashed, but have learned that it’s limits the size of watercolor paper.) To prep the board I spray varnish the out side where I tape the paper, and once that’s dry, I place masking tape along the fold to reinforce it.  I use a 1” binder clip to keep the board and papers together. Depending on conditions, I use the clip to hold the watercolor paper, tape the corners or tape the entire paper down to make that pretty margin, but is eschewed by nearly every watercolor teacher I respect.

Easel and Palettes: The foam core board is light and works well with my Open Box M easel. I have now notch it for landscape and portraits to fit.  I often make two at a time because they do get beat up, but for the most part, they can last for months. However, because I use my easel for both oils and watercolor, I use a piece of plexiglass as a palette for my oils, removing it to insert my watercolor “travel” palettes which fit flat in the base. I simply interchange them.

Miscellaneous Plein Air supplies. Take rags and toss them. Buy papertowels and wet wipes when you arrive, if available, they weren’t in Cuba. If you are carrying paper towels, take the center roll out and flatten the roll of towels for packing. A soap carrier with a bar of Ivory makes it easy to clean brushes. The Dollar Store also offers tools like pliers, screwdriver and a wrench. It’s not easy to find them even in the US if you are out painting in the wilderness and your easel blows over, once, no twice, no three times and you have to de-jam a wingnut. In Cuba, our guide said that these were especially useful gifts to leave behind. In response to a packing list for a workshop in Spain with Timothy J. Clark recommended a Lafuma padded stool. It’s great for demos anytime. It fits in the suitcase, and, straps on to my backpack like a frame. In three years, I have used it to sit on for demos, not to paint, though I do use it as a table for my supplies. When it’s a table, I flip it so the underside of the seat is up, so later, for discussions or critique, I won’t sit down on a paint spatter.

Traveling and painting plein air is the lifestyle I’ve chosen for my “preferment”… my life since working full time. I’ve gotten a sense of organization, efficiency and ease that works for me, so I can take off with minimal planning. I love learning new ideas. I hope you will share yours.

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Other Related Blog Posts by Mary Longe
How to Carry Wet Paintings
The Trail to the Cedarburg Plein Air Festival
Unpacking the Evolution of Learning - Plein Air Trip to Spain
Self Confidence and the Uphill Climb of Learning a New Craft
The Challenge of Painting a Tree
Sketching Arizona
Arctitectural Artifacts, Chicago and Painting Like Hemingway
A Few Things I Learned from my Trip to Santa Fe, July 2015
[1] https://plushfolly.com/Information/Flash-Points

Socks in Box - But Not a Sock's Box at Longe Christmas

Jessica, my son's girlfriend received the first gift to open at our family Christmas Eve celebration after we toasted with Veuve Clicquot bubbly. Immediately a question of where it was made in France arose but the answer wasn't on the bottle. Though out of sequence for the usual festivities, I handed her a package and told her that the answer would be found there. As she ripped off the first revealing strip of wrapping paper, her voice rose with excitement, "we have our own bottle!"

"In this household," I reminded her, "Don't ever trust a box." She found a nice pair of Smart Wool socks in the pretty orange box. The answer wasn't on the box, either.

We returned to the usual progression of events, first up - stockings. I'm pretty much the stocking keeper for our family. As adults we all contribute. I stuff my contribution that follows tradition of a little candy, maybe peanuts and small silly or practical items. This year two stockings had measuring spoons I'd picked up at a trade show in the original "Innovate IT" packaging, a peanut butter and chocolate bar for Alex, dark chocolate caramel's for Karen hair bands for Jess and other stuff I'd found and stashed over the year. When Jess and Alex arrived, he saw the stockings, told me not to look as he added to them. When Karen arrived, she told us not to peek and added more. Though no ritual for opening, we pretty much go round the room, watching one person at a time take something out and commenting. Two salts from Iceland were the first items I found - over the years I've realized it's good to have a world traveling stocking-stuffer family members.


Alex found a 3" rubber chicken. Not from me, obviously it came from his Aunt Karen, also the Icelandic traveler. She and I howled as she relayed the story of the big rubber chicken she'd given Alex in 96 or '97 when he was eleven or twelve years old. For years it was passed back and forth showing up at each other's birthdays, always at Christmas and best, inbetween the sheets, hanging by the neck in a closet or in one of their suitcases. The chicken went missing, probably in moves since college. The replica was a good digestive laugh to remember that silliness.

Gift giving in our family is a wonderful expression of tradition and  humor... like the  socks and the rubber chicken. As I get older, I hope Alex will soak this up and carry the silly traditions that our parents shared with us and came from their parents.  

With Alex in grad school now and his finances tight I'd covered the cost of some items he needed in the name of Christmas. He didn't  have the usual bounty of packages. Though, he opened a Dom Perignom box (it has buttons to unlock it!) where he found a bag of dried fruit and nuts with a note Remember the suit. Silly.

At one point, I ripped the paper off a DVD tax prep program from Alex. He seems to find thoughtful, practical gifts that relate to things we've talked about. "Look at it, Mom." Socks fell out. I'd fallen for my own joke. He does pay attention. They were especially funny Rosie the Riveter socks - not the usual muscle showing Rosie, more... well, an Italian arm gesture sock, that he'd found at the Sock Magic in Santa Fe. The socks in DVD cloaking also brought down the house with extra stories of our tradition of visits to places he's studied... France and Argentina his junior year of college and this year New Mexico while completing an investment bank internship. The photo shows Karen and Alex in front of the Sock Magic store.

Our champagne turned to espresso as we wound down to the end of the gifts. My last one was a fabulous set of plein air watercolor brushes the length of pencils that makes them perfect for tucking into a purse or pocket. Like I said, Alex finds the perfect presents. I just have to remember his diabolical side that he seemed to learn from me.

Karen opened her last gift, wrapped with ribbon and elegant white sparkly paper. Inside, protected by sheets of matching white tissue, the original rubber chicken from Alex. Still smiling from Christmas Eve.

ps. Veuve Clicquot is made in Reims France. 

Plane Air - November 2015

My business travel for the year is over. These sketches were done  earlier this week on my way to, from my hotel and on the way home from Dallas. It wasn't till I saw them together that I noticed that I instinctively chose a Fall palette. Now to fly somewhere where I will intuitively use brighter colors. 

Plane Air - Q1-into Q4 2015

Last year in preparation for retirement someday, I took a plein air watercolor class. Since then I paint in different urban or native locations and return to one place almost weekly to better understand seasons and try new techniques on what is now familiar. It made sense to me that my new life would include travel with someone or by myself and I'd want to be outside as much as possible,  

This year my travel schedule escalated with new responsibilities for facilitating health care executive roundtable events. In Spring I took a Sketchbook Skool class online which legitimized and empowered my sketching in public. In a quest to fulfill homework responsibilities, I quick sketched the seat across from me on the way out. No one complained. No one told me I couldn't.  I sketched another passenger on my way home and on the next flight out too. Voila'! a habit was born.  

Last night as I zipped away my sketchbook in its special Art Supplies pouch in prep for landing on a flight from Phoenix, the attendant stopped and asked if I was an artist. This, I've learned, is a trick question. I don't sell my work, which is 99% of the time the question behind the question. And, yet, yes I sketch and paint and make art. I clarified and said no to her, and clarified again, and said, yes to me. I am an artist in the making.

   

🆑

Restless Vacation - Antique Stores and Finding My Way

With serendipity, I ended up  in an antique store in Lowell, MI where the circles of my life (a la Harry Chapin) started spinning around with a fury. I was supposed to be in Maine, but my watercolor plein air class was cancelled and I decided to create a sta-cation and paint in locations around my home in Chicago... that lasted three days. I was restless.

By Wednesday afternoon, I agreed to meet a high school friend who lives in Ann Arbor for lunch in Kalamazoo halfway between us... By his map. I threw my toothbrush and contact lens supplies in a bag and took off confidently thinking I could find somewhere to paint in Michigan and maybe stay overnight. I called friends (obviously good ones) in Lansing and found a place to catch up, drink some wine, watch the last Jon Stewart and crash. They were leaving early the next morning so I could too. By then, I'd decided to take back roads toward Ionia to check in on my parents, both resting in a sunny spot at Mt Olivet with their parents, grand parents and the village that raised them.

Driving down Ionia's Main Street I stopped for over an hour and sketched my mother's family home, a once gorgeous Victorian with a porch that wraps two sides. My grandpa saw patients in the parlor there after hours.

Directly across the street, I spent many Free Fair weeks with my paternal grandmother in her tiny one bedroom apartment, sleeping on the scratchy horse-hair couch that she made up for me each night. She probably thought the highlight for those "vacations" was the Free Fair midway with the rides and games. It wasn't. It was her tiny white Jiffy mix muffins with a swipe of white butter frosting and the hours I got to play canasta with, as May Sarton said, the "girls" with the grandmother faces, her friends.

Remembering, feeling nostalgic, I continued on Main till I recognized the steep hill to the left and followed it to the crunchy dirt and gravel drive into the cemetery.

My dad visited my mother's grave, then in Florida, every Friday until he couldn't drive. For me, a cemetery is not where or when I remember those who've passed on. Yet, I found something comforting in a reminder of the inevitability of life. That cemetery holds the people that were mythological in my growing up. The owner of the drug store. A much revered great-uncle who helped my dad. The Fred who owned a furniture factory near where when my grandpa laid dying and turned off the noon whistle to not cause him pain. Another Fred along with my grandpa Fred, and the factory owner, Fred (They were known about town as "the three Freds") who started the Free Fair (Both my dad and brother have the middle name of Frederick, AND coincidentally, I married a man whose last name is Frederick. A seventh grade teacher dubbed our son, Alex as “Fred”... a nickname which remains.) Within feet of grandpa's monument there are (at least) three stones of relatives holding my name, Mary E. Longe... another reminder of life here and gone.

I stopped to remember and sketched the scene.

I let the paints dry while I took a swig on a bottle of water and decided the rest of the day.  I  meandered up and down a few streets, but even the plethora of yard sales didn't tempt me to stop. While waiting for traffic to clear on Lincoln, I saw that the road also had a road number, M21. I turned lef, west onto it, figuring my GPS would eventually figure out, a way home. I wasn't ready for the expressway. The trees and grass were too green, the flowers in gardens too vibrant, the sun too bright to not take it in at a slower pace. I needed time to process the day so far.  M21 led me to Lowell.

Maybe as a child with my parents I was in Lowell, but not in any conscious way. I drove into town, decided I was hungry and would pick one once I could see the options.  I drove three or four blocks of downtown, crossed the river, where the antique stores near the west end caught my eye. I circled around, parked, went into one, and promptly bought a new camp chair, still in its original bag, that the owner explained was left in the store when they took over. It appeared perfect for sketching with its back and a little hideaway compartment for, in my case, a sketch book, pens and  paint. Cool find. I walked next door into Glass House Designs and walked out with Christmas presents made by Michigan artists. Cool finds. Walked into Dovetail Antiques. it was the first shop where I wasn't the only customer. There were voices and activity in the back.

None of them heard me yelp. Over in a corner holding dried flowers or something inside it sat a greyed and slightly bowed wood crate with black block lettering, FRIARS ALE, Grand Valley Brewing Company, Ionia Mich… My father was the brewmaster there before I was born from just after prohibition until 1948. Prior to this, the only item from that part of his life that had been passed to me was a small promotional sign, probably made for a bar. The aforementioned Alex/Fred, a craft home-brewer himself, owns the best memorabilia from my brother's collection … Dad's little black leather-bound book, with his notes from brew school (in  Chicago) and the recipes from that brewery.

I left Lowell, after a fantastic lunch a few feet from an old paddle boat that looks like it belongs in New Orleans, by the water at Flat River Grill,. I felt better than elated… content, maybe. Coincidence? I think not. I can’t help but connect dots of having spent time with friends who knew my grandmother and parents,  of visiting the cemetery where I saw the names of the three Freds and “the girls” who taught me card games and my own name on gravestones and, of finding the Friars Ale crate, something my father may have seen stacked in shipping or loaded on a truck. I was ready to come home feeling connected with those who came before. I felt good for having sketched - my present, and a peace about what is to come. I have an unfamiliar sense of being in the right place in my life… not restless.