Throughout his long career, Anatoly Basin has been stretching canvas and preparing it for work all by himself, using classic recipes: linen canvas, fish glue, chalk, white pigment. During the last years, partly due to the astounding cheapness of Chinese produce, but mainly being occupied with a severe disease of his wife, Anatoly started using ready canvases for his small-scale paintings. “Sketches” he calls them. During the summer and autumn of 2012, more than 200 such canvases were painted. Anatoly works mainly at nights, saying that it is a substitute for medication, he just clarifies his mind and “listens to the canvas”.