And a Couple More Pieces of Fabric

This is the last piece of fabric that I worked on Saturday. I applied Presist with a syringe to a plain piece of PFD cotton. This weekend I will paint it red, then wait a couple weeks, remove the Presist and paint it again with yellow. I'm trying to get a piece of deep red orange fabric with yellow markings. I have been thinking about a piece inspired by Buddhist thangkas - not as much detail as many of them have, but my own version.

Now, this piece of fabric was created by Mary Norton. She doesn't like it, she was going to throw it away. I like it, I took it instead. It inspires several surface design ideas for me, most of them better applied once the piece is quilted. I'll try to get at least the quilting done this week.

More Fiddling Around with Fabric

Found some great black cotton sateen at Baron's Fabrics in Camarillo, California. And doesn't great black fabric just beg to have some discharge paste applied? The top photo was stamped with a little plastic lid (in a couple of places I stamped too enthusiastically and you can actually read the word "Dixie"), then I loaded a syringe with the discharge paste and scribbled and made dots. The second piece is a little journal of the day of surface design, again using the syringe loaded with the discharge paste. I found that as I wrote, little bits of fabric fuzz stuck to the tip of the applicator and made the writing blotchier as I went along. In this case, it didn't really matter because I will cut this fabric up when I use it, but it was a useful lesson.

This Is More Like It

Today, my friends, Linda Cassirer and Mary Norton, and I spent a day playing with various techniques and surface design products. We were each working on entirely different projects, but it was great fun to be experimenting in close proximity and be able to benefit from each other's opinions and suggestions as we pursued our own interests.

The first picture is a piece of fabric painted with Pebeo Setacolor to lay down a foundation for using a resist to create texture and depth in fabric painting:

And the next step, once the paint was dry, was to apply some Presist:

And once the Presist was dry, painting again with another color:The Presist is to be removed to let the original colors show through, but since it is removed with water, the paint will cure for two weeks before taking it off. I'll post that step when it happens.

It sure felt good to be flinging color around today!

Ho-Hum

Well, this is what happens when you lose your creative mojo. You make nothing for several months and then end up making perhaps the most colorless shirt on the planet! It's almost like an example of "use it or lose it" of the color-joy muscle. After Jim wears it in a wedding next week, I am going to go wild with the surface design. The worst that could result is that he'll never wear it again. In the meantime, I'd better make a committment to do some kind of art every day in order to keep all the color from running out of my life!

More Painted Fabric

Yesterday at Fibervision we had a fabric painting workshop - these are the two pieces I created. I need to commit some time to making art from some of these wonderful fabrics. In real life the colors are not so close as they look in these photos. I really enjoy this technique, I can start with a vague idea of the colors I want and end up with something either close or nowhere near, but still interesting.

Back to the World

Last week I was fortunate enough to spend three days taking a workshop with artist Liz Berg at Sandy Turner's Out of Hands and Hearts retreat at Cambria Pines Lodge in Cambria, California. The workshop focused on principles of design in order to create successful abstract art. I didn't think to take photos during the workshop, nor are the small pieces I created in the class worth posting, but the class was a great opportunity to hear how the creative process works for one of my favorite artists and provided me with inspiration and plenty to think about as I go about creating my own work in the future.

Of course, I returned to the office today, landing with a solid thud in the midst of daily life. I know my life is pretty darned good, but I certainly miss days filled with art, having my meals provided on a regular schedule, a room straightened and vacuumed daily by someone else, and happy hour with Cadillac Margaritas at half price while chatting and laughing with like-minded women. Now that I've spent some time with Jim, slept in my own bed a few nights and done some laundry, I'm ready to go back. Sigh.

The two top photos above were taken on the grounds at Cambria Pines Lodge. I love the sense of humor that came up with the "flower bed." The crow was at this fountain almost every time I walked by and seemed very comfortable with having people around. The third photo is some flotsam washed up on Moonstone Beach that caught my attention as a very appealing natural composition.

California Spring

A couple of weeks ago some friends and I spent a day in the Santa Ynez Valley and were dazzled by the luscious green hills and the profusion of wild flowers everywhere. Poppies were even coming up through the cracks in the pavement. Gorgeous day and great fun with good friends. Sorry I don't have any photos to share.

I am participating in the postcard exchange for the Cyber Fyber Exhibition being sponsored by Susan Lenz and was inspired to create my own version of the green hills, the lupine, and the poppies for her. The card is made from commercial fabric stamped with gold metallic ink, stenciled with foil glue then foiled with silver, foil glue randomly applied and foiled with green, and embroidery.

All traded postcards will be displayed at CYBER FYBER, January 8 - 20, 2009 at Gallery 80808/Vista Studios in Columbia, SC. Check out Susan's blog for all the exchanges, I'm #139.