Shipping a painting is quite complicated especially if it is gonna be an international one. From the careful packing, materials used, and customs requirements.

As said in my previous post, the painting that I need to ship from Philippines to France is 127cm x 198.12cm (4ft x 6.5ft) which is really as big and the shipping cost is expectedly high. With the frame (the wood mount), it is really heavy and I can estimate it to be 10 kg because the wood was thick. So, it was really not an option to ship the painting while it's mounted on the wood frame. Instead, I'll just remove the canvas from the mount, ship it in its rolled form, and just hire a company who can frame it in Paris.

A few weeks ahead, I had to plan on how to pack it and what the materials I can use to ship the painting properly. The canvas is just a cloth and the paint is flexible but of course caution is still necessary as you don't want it to be folded during shipping or have the paint stick together.

Materials

Glassine is the most important thing in packaging paintings. It protects the painting from sticking together when rolled and separates (and also protects) it from other packaging materials (if not rolled). If you put paper or plastic on top of the paint, there is a big chance it will stick and I have experienced that myself. It was a real hassle to remove and sometimes the mess is actually permanent. :D

So weeks prior, I ordered some glassine sheets from Shopee. There are shops that sell that in my city for sure, especially baking material shops... but I don't have the time to go around and look for it.

The second material that I bought was a foam wrap. I ordered different thickness since I wasn't sure how much or less I would need for everything to fit in a shipping/mailing tube.

Lastly, I bought some mailing tubes. It was hard to find here and I was only able to buy the ones with 3 inches diameter on the inside.

Packing

After removing the canvas from its wood frame/skeleton, I taped some glassine to the whole painting.

Then I put the thinnest foam on top and started rolling it. In 25% of rolling, it was really thick already that it won't fit my mailing tubes anymore. :D So I just rolled everything in thin and thick foam and hoped it won't get squished during shipping haha.

Courier

My first choice was really FedEx since that's the courier for my previous exhibit which was also in Paris. As far as I can remember, it took about 10 days or less to get there and there was about 2-3 days customs processing.

Before I even got inside the mall (where the FedEx branch was), the guard was quite suspicious of my package. Well to be fair, it looked like a big sausage and I actually didn't realize that we were having our annual festival that time so the security around was on high alert.

The security asked me several questions about what's inside and where I'm going. It wasn't clear to him at first that I'm taking it to a courier so he was asking me some time of permit. In the end I made it clear I'm a customer trying to ship my package (that looks like a big white sausage). He scanned it with his metal thing and called a K9 unit.

Look at that good boi on duty!!!

The handler (or whatever you call him) was trying to let him sniff the package but he was totally ignoring it. He was sniffing beside it and in the end the K9 guy said it was clear. What a good boiiiii! :D

I went to FedEx and the lady asked what's inside my package and checked on her computer to see if they still accept it since their policies just changed a few months ago. Well yep, Murphy's law, she just confirmed they aren't accepting paintings anymore (to France at least). She said they only accept documents now and suggested to take it to DHL.

Good thing DHL is only beside the store haha so I came there and asked. They do accept it BUT I need to put my package in a box. The reason was so they can measure the dimensions so it has to be rectangular. I was like... uh oh another delay... :D

The DHL guy was kind and helpful and gave me tips on what possible documents I should bring for customs clearance. He also gave me an initial quote for the shipping by estimating how big the box could be and he said it would go for $1k. :D I was prepared for the costly shipping but I thought it would be cheaper than last year since this was really light but apparently they care more about the dimension than the weight.

Another thing is that it was a holiday and weekend was coming... I came in on Friday and they will only start moving the packages on the next business day which is Monday. So I bought a box at the mall (while carrying this sausage :D) and went home.

I bought a 2x2x2 box at the book store and I honestly don't know where else to find them so I just bought the easiest to find even though the size of this thing literally doesn't match my package. :D

But I am resourceful and years of crafting and scrapbooking when I was younger helped a lot when making the box. In the end, I was able to make a good one, and taped them properly.

I brought the smaller package since I folded the edges of the canvas (that I didn't do in the previous packing) and the DHL guy was impressed with how I made the box. B-)
He was like "You made the box yourself??? This was a good one. You're truly an artist". Like, did you think I was just pretending I'm an artist? lol.

When it comes to customs, I did a research and at the same time consulted with the exhibit organizers and I didn't need to send them some museum certificate or whatever random documents I really don't understand about. I declared it as a wall decor which has risks as well but I was okay with it rather than bother with all the other permits. The disadvantage of this one was that if this package gets lost or get on fire or whatever, they will only give back (or refund?) the amount that I declared but I was okay with it.

I was really really worried about my package not arriving on time since DHL said the shipping time is 5-10 BUSINESS DAYS but I was just fuck iittt and sent it. I was confident it will arrive on time and everything will be alright because it always does...

In the end, it arrived after 3 days!!! It only stayed a few hours in customs really... it was approved immediately. I was really impressed and even though I paid $600 for the shipping fee, it was all worth it since it arrived safely. It's now in the hands of the framers' and they will drop the framed painting back in the organizers' warehouse for the exhibit!

Everything in shipping was so stressful but I will not do this again - doing things near the deadline. lol. I will always give time allowance so I don't have to stress out about this anymore. DHL is a good courier and they have never failed me so far.