32x40 3D Pro Pau Canvas 2-1/2" #DP-3240

True 5:4 Photography Proportion - 32x40 Size

This is exactly double the size of the 16x20.

The 5:4 aspect ratio is common to both art and portrait photography, as it creates a visually pleasing format for the human figure and face. The balanced compositional format can help to create a sense of symmetry and harmony in your artwork. The 5:4 ratio has a familiar "feel", as it was commonly used in early computer monitors. Additionally, you might consider trying some relatively unknown sizes in this same proportion that we call Lost Sizes As an artist, you get the best of both worlds, because you still get to use the same aesthetically appealing 5:4 format and use rare or novel sizes that help make your art stand-out.

Explore other sizes in this same 5:4 aspect ratio:

8x10 • 12x15 • 16x20 • 20x25 • 24x30 • 28x35 • 36x45 • 40X50 • 44x55 • 48x60 • 52x65 • 56x70 • 60x75 • 64x80 • 68x85 • 72x90 • 76x95

Explore Related Products to this 32x40 Size:

• Acrylic Primed Linen: Muir™ • Vintage L22U™ • Santa Cruz™ • Saint-Cloud™ • Grenoble™
• Raw Unprimed Linen: Torrey Pines™ • Mandalay™

Pau™ Portrait Smooth Acrylic Primed Artfix Linen

Experience unparalleled artistic precision with this very smooth linen canvas.  It is a sanctuary for artists who delight in precision and fine detailing. It brings portraiture and intricate designs to life with breathtaking clarity. Pau™ embodies luxury. The high thread count helps make it smooth.  Its heavy white ground casts a luminous bright white hue that adds brilliance to your artwork. This canvas combines the best qualities of oil-based primers with the flexibility and resilience of acrylic, offering a unique blend of features. Its absorbent nature makes it ideal for drawing media like oil sticks, pastels, charcoal, and graphite. For artists using delicate mediums such as egg tempera and caseins, mounting this canvas on a rigid surface enhances its capabilities, allowing its super smooth texture to shine, and delivering unparalleled results.

• 100% Belgian Linen 6.1 oz.; Primed Weight 15 oz. per square yard
• Medium Heavy Weight, Fine Weave, Portrait Smooth Texture
• Double Sized and Quadruple Primed with acid-free archival quality acrylic gesso
• Impenetrable ground prevents oil paint from leaching through and harming the canvas
• For acrylics, oils, alkyds, and water miscible oil paints
• Linen has natural oils that prevent disintegration over time.

3D™ Pro 2.5 Stretcher Bar • 1/2" Canvas Clearance

1/2" Canvas Clearance is the space between the Bar and the canvas. Generally speaking, more clearance reduces the risk of the canvas touching the wood and creating unsightly lines during painting. Our design provides the optimal clearance so as not to impact your painting, but still leaving enough wood to the maximize strength of the Stretcher Bar.

• Produces a 2.5" deep stretched canvas (Actual depth is slightly thinner)
• 1.25" wide Stretcher Bar
• All Bars have an exclusive groove on the inside perimeter of the frame to which cross braces and Diamond Corner Braces attach
• Solid Ponderosa Pine or Fir from the Pacific Northwest

Finger Jointed Wood is not meant for Stretcher Bars

Solid wood makes the most dependable Stretcher Bar, because one homogeneous wood member is going to behave similarly across the entire length of the Bar. Whereas, with finger-jointed wood is made-up of multiple pieces of wood, sometimes on the actual joint itself, presenting multiple points of failure which no one can control.

We only use Solid Wood to build our Stretcher Bars because a solid piece of wood will last indefinitely. When we speak of archival value, it's not just the paint you use and the quality of your canvas and ground, even the wood choices manufacturers add or reduce value to your final painting. The fact is, you don't want problems, and finger joints only increase that risk of the wood falling apart in the future.

The glue used to bind finger joints is a water based adhesive and when that wood is exposed to high humidity environments, particularly with exterior walls, the glue joints can give-up. As a manufacturer, Masterpiece® does its part to conserve as much wood as possible, and still provide a quality product that will out-perform any other in the marketplace.

32x40 2.5" Deep Edge Heavy Frame Offers Maximum Support!

• Drawing depicts the exact frame construction, not the proportion
• 2.5" Deep Edge K2 Heavy Stretcher Bars are precision machined with a unique double tongue-and-groove corner joint that provides rock-solid torsional rigidity that resists warping or twisting, which is an important benefit for such a deep edge canvas
• One super strong 3/4" thick keyable brace and one cross brace (all 3.25" wide) provide the maximum possible support for this 32x40 frame; Cross Braces are permanently installed in the frame, but canvas tension may be increased by tapping-in the keys or wedges that slightly expand the size of the frame
• The Stretcher Bars have an proprietary utility groove on the inside perimeter of the frame which is used to attach braces and other optional frame supports
• The Masterpiece braces feature an exclusive system that allows you to increase the tension to the middle of the frame, where the tension is needed the most; it's so unique it earned us a patent
• Our state-of-the-art cross braces attach the ends of the cross braces into the (grooved) sides of the braces, which creates a superior and robust system of interlocking cross braces
• To increase canvas tension: 1) remove any staples in the corners and those that retain the brace keys in the middle, 2) tap all of the expansion keys further into their respective slots, 3) tighten and re-staple the canvas in the corners

Canvas Tension is in Your Control

In dry climates or air conditioned environments, the lack of moisture in the air causes wood frames to shrink and the canvas fibers to narrow and elongate making the canvas more slack and resulting in a loss of canvas tension. In some instances, the canvas could have waves on the surface resulting in an unsightly viewing experience.

Our 3D™ Pro 2.5 professional frames provide the functionality for you to slightly expand the size of the frame in the corners and the middle of the canvas, thereby increasing canvas tension all across the surface. The difference between a loose canvas and a tight canvas is just 1/8" of an inch, so a small adjustment using our corner and brace keys makes an important difference in canvas tension.

• Helps to prevent waves that occur in a loose canvas
• Increase canvas tension by tapping-in the corner and brace keys
• True professional class canvases make it possible for you to adjust the canvas tension

Cross Braces Make it Tighter

A tightly stretched canvas on an un-braced frame overpowers the Stretcher Bars causing them to bow inward and thereby lose tension. Sometimes that bow can expose a space in picture frames.

When a canvas is stretched on a properly supported frame, the cross-braces prevent the Bars from bowing thereby achieving maximum canvas tension. To increase the canvas tension even more, simply tap the corner and brace keys further in their slots. Properly supported frames provide you with the control over the canvas tension of your canvas and painting.

Forests need People, and People Need Forests

The concept of sustainability presupposes a comprehensive engagement of individuals in the art and science of forest stewardship, both in the present and for the well-being of generations to come. Humanity undoubtedly extracts wood from forests to supplement our needs, but they also play a crucial role in bestowing diligent care upon these ecosystems. This stewardship encompasses not only the responsible harvesting of forest resources but also extends to the safeguarding of clean water sources, the preservation of wildlife and their native habitats, and the mitigation of potential threats like erosion, fires, and diseases that could otherwise lead to untimely degradation of these precious woodlands.

Masterpiece® uses only lumber harvested from responsibly and sustainably managed timberlands.

Specially Dried and Heat Treated Lumber

Our wood is handpicked from a curated group of environmentally responsible lumber mills in the Pacific Northwest. By adhering to our precise drying and heat-treatment standards, these mills produce lumber with nearly half the moisture you'd find in common home improvement outlets or lumber yards. This meticulous process not only enhances the wood's strength—minimizing risks of cracks, splits, or bends—but also elevates its dimensional stability. Such quality, despite its premium, is paramount in creating professional canvases designed to uphold the sanctity of your cherished art throughout the years.

MuseumWrap™ Stretching Technique

With more than a half a century of American engineering, Masterpiece® designs and builds its own proprietary stretching equipment that enables us to produce the finest and most tightly-stretched canvas on the market.

• Drum-tight stretch!
• Up to 50% tighter than other methods
• Balanced tension across the surface
• Uncut folded corners make it possible to remove and re-stretch canvas on the same size frame
• Usually the corner folds are on the long sides

The canvas you choose is the foundation for your painting, but also serves as symbol of the quality that you as an artist stand for, and reflect on your own brand. Masterpiece® serves as your silent partner to create your next masterpiece. You "wow" them from the front, while we "wow" them from behind.

Only when he no longer knows what he is doing does the painter do good things. ♦ Edgar Degas

Edgar Degas, a masterful artist celebrated for his innovative approach to composition and form, often pushed boundaries in his art career. This sentiment captures the essence of spontaneous creativity, where overthinking can sometimes stifle genuine inspiration. For Degas, the unconscious act of creation, free from the constraints of rigorous thought, often led to the most profound artistic revelations.

Artists recognize that there are moments of pure, unfiltered creativity that occur when we let go of our preconceived notions and allow intuition to take the lead. In these moments, we find ourselves venturing into the unknown, experimenting with techniques and colors, and creating something unexpectedly beautiful. Degas encourages us to embrace uncertainty in our artistic endeavors. For it is in these uncharted territories, when we release our tight grip on control, that we often find our most authentic and evocative expressions.

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The spirit of artistry is inspiration and creation. We too are inspired by the wisdom of this quote and hope you are inspired by our interpretation thereof, as well as this inimitable portrait we created of Edgar Degas. Go create!