June Sun Printing Party

Thanks for all of the great response about the sun printing fun we'll have in June.

For those of you who don't know me, I'm Lynda from Bloombakecreate.com, a new resident artist here. I've always loved creating, but the surface design bug didn't bite me until three years ago while interviewing a local artist for my hometown newspaper column, Telling Your Story. I was so excited about her work with snow dyeing that when the next snow fell,  I was ready. Since we don't get a lot of snow here, I got to thinking about snow and how it is just ice crystals. Why not just use ice cubes?  I loved how my ice dyed fabric turned out so much that I ended up writing an article on ice dyeing for Quilting Arts magazine in 2011. That's how it all began. I quit writing the column to spend more time on my art.

For June we will be exploring all different options for sun printing.

So far, I have two great artists to help me this month.

Sue Andrus is a textile artist inspired by flowers, gardens and nature. She has had several art quilts and garden photos in special exhibits at the International Quilt Festivals, and other shows. Sue grew up in rural Western New York, and moved to Towanda, Pennsylvania with a degree in horticulture. She worked in the floriculture industry for nearly 30 years while beginning her art business and raising three sons. Not finding just the right colors of fabric in stores, she began painting and dyeing her own fabrics, and now uses them almost exclusively in her art. Sunprinting fabrics with leaves and flowers bring her two main passions together - Gardening and Fabric Art. Sue's many gardens contain plants collected over the years and supply most of the materials used for her sunprinting, as well as inspiring new art pieces. In addition to Art Quilts, she designs and creates gift items including jewelry, fabric covered journals and photo albums, tote bags and more using mostly her sun printed or hand dyed fabrics. You can find Sue at andrusgardensquilts.com.

After more than 20 years as a traditional quilter, LuAnn Kessi began playing with surface design techniques 5 years ago. Her favorite fabric to buy is a bolt of white cotton so she can dye it, paint it, hot wax it, tie it, scrunch it, screen print and lots more.  She turns these newly created fabrics into art quilts.  LuAnn lives on a cattle ranch in Western Oregon and works in her studio, the Thread Shed. Check on  LuAnn's art at luannkessi.blogspot.com.

I'm still looking for someone who uses Inkodye. Also, if you have an interesting spin on sun printing, please feel free to email me at lheines at wowway dot com.

It's going to be a fun and warm (I hope!) month.