Thanks to this years artists

I wanted to thank all of the artists who have contributed so richly to our knowledge of surface design and fiber art techniques. Judging from the comments, many people learned a lot and enjoyed the "workshops". Next year we have many of the resident artists  returning and some new ones as well. Thank you all for following our blog and 

The big finale

First of all, my computer crashed and burned; may it rest in peace...

I really limited my pictures because I took way too many. This first piece of fabric had the discharge paste on it and was by far the most beautiful piece done. I have included 2 detailed pictures.

This was done with the Clorox bleach pen and this is the finished product. If you don't see the circles, it is because the bleach pen did NOTHING.

This one had the Clorox toilet bowl cleaner and it worked well and fast. I think if I use the toilet bowl cleaner again, I will stop the bleaching process much sooner. In my opinion, it took too much color out - my fault.

In an effort to add a bit of color, I totally ruined this piece of fabric

Another example of not stopping soon enough but all in all it was very usable.

This piece was saved with bleach. The original was nothing but blobs of color and not in a good way.

OK, so now what am I going to do with it? I already had this project in mind when I started the add and subtract color process.  Every year I make solstice cards and after the election I wanted to make a positive statement so I selected two quotes from Dr. Martin Luther King and made bookmarks.

I got  out my roll of steam a seam and bonded the steam a seam to the backs of the printed bookmarks.

The I trimmed and cut the individual bookmarks

I think they came out well and I can give my friends a positive Solstice greeting they can use all year.

I  hope you found this colorful if not useful (smile). See you next year!!

Taking away the color

There are so many ways to remove color. I was totally planning on using discharge paste. I knew the design I wanted to create but how to do it with Discharge paste; it had to dry completely before ironing. Patience isn't one of my virtues but "thrift" is. I imagined cramming a $30. jar of discharge paste into a tube. I think I have a better idea.

I got this idea from Jane Dunnewold years ago. As I was pulling it off my shelf, it accidentally squirted on this corner of the fabric. I waited and watched. I didn't have to wait long. I LIKED it!!

I went on a squirting attack since only one of the fabrics came out of the dye line process with any hope.

This should be interesting

This was the WORST failure of all - just globs and blobs of color.

Now for the fabric I liked the best with the grape bubbles along the line. I would try discharge paste on large bubble wrap and presse it on like a stamp.

I laid the fabric down one the bubble wrap and pressed the bits of discharge paste into the fabric.

You can see the damp spots of discharge paste coming through the fabric

This was one final experiement. Clorox bleach pen.

The final reveal Friday

Adding color

My dear friend Judith and I have experimented with line for a few years. We have had marginal success. I decided to take these three fabric and add color using line. What type of line depended on the fabric.

First I mixed up some print paste (Thick SH from ProChem)

Next I added a knife tips worth of dye to my hair coloring bottles which have nice nozzles.

I laid out my fabric on plastic. I really only did this because I just bought that green cutting mat  and haven't even made one cut on it yet. One of the plastic runners is from IKEA and has bumpies on one side. That was the side I placed up (happy accident)

Next I sprayed the fabric with soda ask thinking it would dry quickly - WRONG

I became impatient and applies the thickened dyes. These are the end results, washed and ironed. The top pic is the back and the bottom pic the front

This was the happy accident. These are both front pictures. Look at those cool grape like bubbles along the line. The bumpies on the plastic runner created those cool circles.

This started with such promise but the still damp fabric caused the dyes to spread - UGH.

 Front above and back below. How can this be saved???

Both sides are awful. This was supposed to be writing but the damp fabric spread the dye. a disaster?????? Wait and see.....

Fun with failed fabrics

Sorry this is late

The the last technique of the month, I want to do some "experimental" dyeing on some weird pieces of fabric I will probably never use otherwise. This could make the difference in a winner or a loser. You can decide. My primary plan is to add color and subtract color. So how will I do this?

I am starting out with four pieces of fabric.

The piece above was a batik but instead of just dyeing it I scraped on some thickened dye the dribble on some more liquid dye. As you can see I used 2 variations on a theme,small and large.

This piece was awful fabric, coarse and low thread count. It was the first bolt I bought of PFD fabric. I never did that again. I am not really sure how the yellow and red swirls got the the white fabric but during a snow dyeing session, I grabbed it and piled snow over it. I LOVE the way the snow dyeing came out but it's unusable because of the red and yellow dyes.

These last two are cleanup rags. 

I do have a practical plan for these fabrics so I hope you will stick around and view the final outcome.

More Fusing Fun

This is a technique I learned MANY years ago and thought I would share it. Good to know for "fabric sketches"

Riffing on an inspiration

I was going to do this week on fusing but while preparing I went off the rails. What I now want to present is a way of using fusing to do fabric "sketches".
A couple of years ago I took a workshop at the Crow Barn with Terry Jarrard-Dimond. She asked us to bring an inspiration and I brought a huge book of photos of Andy Goldworthy's work. I can't imagine anyone more inspirational than him. The photo I used is in the book "Andy Goldsworthy, A Collaboration with Nature". It was a gift from a friend

Photo by Andy Goldsworthy

I made this quickly cutting and fusing. The women in the class were surprised I turned out four pieces in one day. Fusing made that possible.

So where do I go from there?

And there

And there?

Magpies at Sunrise

                 

They look like poppies

All 96 of them