Paper Lamination

A technique that I use which involves the use of polyester is paper lamination.

I was introduced to this by Claire Benn when I used to study at C2C.

 Together with Leslie Morgan and Jane Dunnewold she has written a very comprehensive book Paper & Metal Leaf  Lamination.

Whilst you can also use silk for this process Claire recommends that if you are new to the process you use polyester. This will also mean that you have the opportunity to use a soldering iron to further develop the work.

Here is what you will need to get you started.

Sheer polyester fabric, matt medium, thermofax or screen, squeegee and images. These need to be either photocopies or newspaper.

I’m going to post a link to Claire’s video on you tube so I’ll not go into process detail but briefly you lay your images down on a bench covered with a drop cloth.

You pin a piece of polyester fabric tightly over the top and screen print with the matt medium.

I'm using some photocopies of family photographs

Screen print with a thermofax or silkscreen using the matt medium.

When the piece is thoroughly dry you need to carefully iron the piece without any steam using a hot iron. Cover the fabric with baking parchment to avoid any potential risk of  melting of the fabric!!

Having done this dunk the fabric into a bucket of water and leave for a short while. Cover the bench with plastic and with paper side up begin to rub away the paper.

Here are a few images of some of my work made using this method.

This piece is made using adverts for houses from our local newspaper. I laid them out

covered them with a piece of polyester and screened the matt medium through a screen on which I had put the image of the outline of a house.

These laminations can be used as resists for screen printing onto fabric using the medium of choice.

I prefer to use the laminations as art pieces. I often use two layers of lamination as in the pieces below. After the first pieces are made as the instructions above I lay the lamination over some more images and screen the matt medium through a blank screen.

When dry I iron the fabric then dunk it in the water and remove the back of the paper.

The second layer adheres to the spaces that were left bare by the first screening.

 This is a close up of a work in progress and shows two layers. The first was coloured paper cut from a newspaper and the second was some text that I had manipulated on the computer.

Below are two pieces I have sewn onto canvasses.

I will post a link to Claire Benn's video on you tube. It can be found here

Join me on Monday when I will show some of my most recent work